


watching the waiting.

by disarmingly



Category: The Grisha Trilogy - Leigh Bardugo
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon Compliant, Gen, M/M, Makeouts, Mal POV - Freeform, Other, i'm proud of both of them, just FYI, mal pines even when he doesn't realize it, malkolai, nikolai is insufferable, spoilers for ruin and rising, spoilers for siege and storm, zoyalina is technically background
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-08
Updated: 2020-04-08
Packaged: 2021-03-02 05:13:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 32,669
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23539678
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/disarmingly/pseuds/disarmingly
Summary: Sturmhond catches Mal off-guard.aka. sometimes a tracker has to find the prince of ravka in the borderlands. and sometimes, there's more to the story than that.this is the mal/nikolai canon-divergent fic no one asked for, but I was compelled to write. you're welcome.
Relationships: Nikolai Lantsov/Mal Oretsev
Comments: 11
Kudos: 32





	watching the waiting.

**Author's Note:**

> this fic takes place (almost) entirely within the canon and canon timeline. scenes mimic the book pretty closely and the dialogue in those scenes are entirely of leigh bardugo’s making. 
> 
> additionally, a LOT of these scenes will skip over months/periods of the book. I focus primarily on scenes that have both Mal and Nikolai so I’m so sorry if that gets a little confusing. I’ve tried to give little titles for where the scenes take place but this is PRIMARILY set during Ruin and Rising (with a LITTLE out of Siege and Storm). Down at the bottom I’ve got a note that mimics the order of the scenes with their chapters if that helps anyone!!! but really this is just fun and I love this ship and i needed….content…..so here I am.
> 
> title is from watching the waiting by wye oak.
> 
> special thanks and special love to @_sylbur_ (insta and twitter) for basically everything that brought this fic into being. for being a beta, but also so so much more.

**THE TRUE SEA**

Sturmhond catches Mal off-guard.

And maybe that’s putting it lightly - between being kidnapped and held captive and watching the pirate ( _privateer_ ) take back his ship and Alina and Mal with it - there is a lot more to the man than Mal can wrap his head around. He’d heard stories, sure. Known the name. But seeing the man behind the myth?

He has a disarming smile and a direct sort of being that gets under Mal’s skin. Not in a bad way, Mal finds. Just different. Unique.

But on top of all of that, he’s a captain loved by his crew, and Mal can understand why. Despite the events that brought them all together, Mal and Alina were adopted with very little argument, given jobs and things to do with their hands. Tolya and Tamar were good people, took quickly to Alina which made them even better in Mal’s eyes, and Sturmhond took an interest in making sure the two were trained with swords and rapiers, both of which Mal likes quite a bit. Tamar teaches Alina, and Sturmhond Mal.

The blades are dulled, which is probably why Mal isn’t nearly as worried as he should be, given Sturmhond’s skill. Hit to the shoulder, Mal laughs. Sturmhond gets an edge under Mal’s ankle that sends him sprawling, and Mal laughs again. 

He’s not imagining things when he sees Sturmhond crack a smile at him either, reaching down to help Mal back on his feet.

“If you laugh like that in battle, you may just throw them off enough to get a hit in.”

Mal settles on his feet, one hand still wrapped around Sturmhond’s wrist, and deftly taps the blade of his sword to Sturmhond’s shoulder. “I can get a hit in.”

That’s when he feels Sturmhond’s sword press into his side, right under his ribcage. His grin is crooked, but wide. “If you have to be this close, you might want to try another tactic.”

Mal shoves back, creating space between them, but he’s not sure if that’s in reaction to the fact if these were real blades he would be dead, or the way his neck feels a bit too warm under that grin. Sturmhond rolls his neck casually, like he’s just now warming up.

They settle into stances again, and Mal makes the first move, his blade swinging in a wide arch that Sturmhond deflects easily.

“Keep your elbows in!” He berates. “Stop flapping them like some kind of chicken.”

This time it’s Mal who grins, letting out a clucking sound. He can feel Alina and Tamar’s eyes turn to him, but Mal’s eyes are still on Sturmhond, who sighs.

Mal strikes, trying to take advantage of the moment, but once again Sturmhond deflects him. “Again.” He says, and Mal moves.

He likes this. He likes the ship, and the deck, Tamar’s sharp grin and Tolya’s calming presence. He likes how Alina seems to have finally relaxed around these people, and how they can finally breathe for a moment. 

He likes Sturmhond most out of it all, he thinks, but no one needs to know that.  
  
  


**OUTSIDE OF KRIBIRSK**

It’s hard to breathe.

Not because of the fight - going into the Fold had been dangerous, it shouldn’t have happened at all, but Mal feels the adrenaline still running under his skin. How incredible it had been to see how those new guns had worked against the Volcra. He is still worried about what happened with Alina, yes, but this sense of being full and alive and coming _out_ of the Fold was a feeling he wanted to hold onto.

Except that isn’t going to happen. Not in the face of _this_.

They’d gone into the Fold. They’d gone after the Volcra’s nest. Now they were crash-landed outside of Kribirsk with a destroyed ship and someone they’ve never seen before out in the water. Someone who, when they started their journey, he’d believed to be Sturmhond.

He jumps to his feet, Alina still and tense at his side. “What the hell is this?” 

Mal’s caught off guard, again, but it’s more than that. Different. Where before the feeling had felt a little like flying, this is a tightness around his chest, a kind of swelling in his lungs. It feels a lot like suffocating, but not quite. Maybe he’s being dramatic, but the man standing in front of him is not the man he thought. Not the captain he’d agreed to fight alongside when they left the ship.

Sturmhond runs a hand over his face. His new, clean, strong features. Golden, short-cropped hair. _Military_ cut, Mal realizes with a start. And bright, hazel eyes where there had been ruddy green. Mal almost misses the muddy nature of them, the way they’d changed, gotten brighter, when they’d sparred. In all honesty, Mal feels like he’s _lost_ something, looking at the man in front of him.

_And saints, he’s handsome._

And Mal hates himself just a little bit for that thought, tensing where he stands. Readying for a fight.

Alina speaks then, and jerks Mal out of his thoughts. “You have a Tailor.”

Sturmhond winces, and Mal’s anger flares again.

“I am not a tailor.” Tolya is angry when he chimes in.

“No, Tolya, your gifts lie elsewhere.” Sturmhond is trying to calm down the situation, Mal can tell that from how he shifts. How directly calm his voice is. He hates himself for noticing, too, but hates Sturmhond more. “Mostly in the celebrated fields of killing and maiming.”

“Why would you do this?” Alina’s just as confused and hurt as Mal is, but she’s at least asking the right questions.

“It was essential that the Darkling not recognize me.” Like it was the most obvious thing. Like they all should have known that much. It becomes increasingly clear to Mal, then, how no one else in Sturmhond’s crew seems upset about the unveiling. Or even half-bothered. _What is going on?_ “He hasn’t seen me since I was fourteen, but it wasn’t something I wanted to chance.”

 _Fourteen?_ _The Darkling_? Mal’s head starts to spin, but he clings to the bright, hot fury curling in his gut to ground him. “Who _are_ you?” 

Sturmhond catches Mal’s eyes for a moment- no, not Sturmhond. Mal catches a stranger’s eyes, and wrestles with the fact they can somehow still seem familiar. Like Sturmhond is trying to get Mal to calm down. 

“That’s a complicated question.”

“Actually, it’s pretty straightforward.” Alina is so, so angry, and Mal is forever grateful for the sharp edge to her voice as she jumps to her feet. “But it does require telling the truth. Something you seem thoroughly incapable of.”

“Oh, I can do it.” Sturmhond walks out from the water, shaking his boots. “I’m just not very good at it.”

Mal sees red, and before he really knows what he’s doing, advances on Sturmhond. He’s not doing this anymore. He’s not. Nevermind the feeling still constricting around his throat, he will not just sit here and be played with.

“Sturmhond. You have exactly ten seconds to explain yourself, or Tolya’s going to have to make you a whole new face.”

Before he can act on the threat, he’s cut off - Tamar hears something, and then they all do. Movement out in the grass around them. Mal almost feels guilty for not sensing them earlier, but given the current state of things, he gives himself a pass. But then everything happens a little too quickly - too many footsteps, Sturmhond’s long sigh, a kind of surrounding tension as hands reach for weapons. The possibility of danger quells a bit of Mal’s anger, but not all of it.

“I knew we’d been sighted. We spent too long on the Fold. A wrecked ship and a crew that looks like a bunch of drowned possums. This is not what I had in mind.”

Mal turns on Sturmhond, mouth open to demand to know what he means, but thirty First Army soldiers break through the trees and panic, solid and overwhelming, adds to the constrictions around Mal’s chest.

 _I will not be taken prisoner again_.

Alina and Sturmhond exchange a few whispered comments, but Mal doesn’t catch them, the ringing in his ears too deafening. He needs to find a way out of this. Needs to get to Alina and _get out_. As much as he wants answers from Sturmhond, as much as he feels he is _owed_ them, they don’t have time. He’s a traitor, a deserter, and in the face of this large a faction of First Army soldiers, the only thing he has is time.

_Run._

That is when he steals a glance back to Sturmhond, his eyes widening as the privateer slowly peels his drenched greatcoat from his shoulders, the olive drab and brass buttons clear, even in the bare beginnings of morning. Mal’s stomach drops, then, as his eyes fall to the golden double eagle on his chest. A soldier- no. An officer. Of the First Army.

 _What_?

Suddenly, Colonel Raevsky breaks through the ranks on horseback. Mal starts, recognizing him from the military camp in Kribirsk. Panic rises again but the Colonel’s attention is solely on Sturmhond. “Explain yourself, boy! State your name and business before I have you stripped of that uniform and strung up from a high tree.”

In a brief moment, Mal wonders if he should step in. Sturmhond is clearly out of his element, and whatever lie he’s playing at now is going to get him killed. Mal will get taken prisoner, of course, and probably put to death, but if he can give the crew and Alina a way out-

That is when Sturmhond speaks, with a kind of presence and tone that Mal has _never_ heard from him before. It feels more solid, more heavy, more demanding of attention and respect. It cuts directly through Mal, through the panic and the tension, and settles deep in his chest.

“I am Nikolai Lantsov, Major of the Twenty-Second Regiment, Soldier of the King’s Army, Grand Duke of Udova, and second son to His Most Royal Majesty, King Alexander the Third, Ruler of the Double Eagle Throne, may his life and reign be long.”

_What?_

A cold shudder passes through Mal then, shock and confusion and disbelief all rolled into one. Raevsky doesn’t believe it at first, understandably, and he jumps down from his horse and advances on Sturmhond.

“You listen to me, you disrespectful whelp. Nikolai Lantsov served under me on the northern border and…”

He stops. Trails off. And Mal feels the fight and panic leave him in a single breath. 

It’s not a lie. This is all actually happening.

Raevsky freezes, inches from Sturmhond’s face, before pulling away from him. Seeing something there that - quite literally - brings him to his knees.

“Forgive me, moi tsarevich. Welcome home.”

The soldiers behind Raevksy start to exchange glances, but all Mal can do is stare at Sturmhond. His time on the ship passes by him, like a sharp wind tugging at the hem of his coat. The lessons, the laughs, the stories - _Sturmhond_ , grinning at him, knocking him on his ass when he grins back.

Sturmhond turns, but not towards Mal or his crew, but instead towards the rows of First Army soldiers. There’s a different feeling coming off of him, now. Command, but something else. Expectation. A cool familiarity at seeing the lines of uniformed men. Mal turns and watches as each of them step from their horse and drop to their knees, mirroring their Colonel.

Greetings for royalty. For a prince. _Second son to His Most Royal Majesty, King Alexander the Third, Ruler of the Double Eagle Throne, may his life and reign be long._

“You’ve got to be kidding me.” Mal mutters, defeated. A new kind of feeling settles in his chest, then, but it’s one he’s grown used to by now.

The feeling he tried to ignore with each unanswered letter he sent to Alina, during her time in the Little Palace. The feeling he swallows down every time he watches her step back into the sun. The feeling that fills the space of what might have been something for him, something that could have been his, if he’d just held onto it a little longer.

The feeling of betrayal, but mostly of loss.

The feeling of being left behind.

  
  


**OS ALTA, RAVKA**

Mal does not want to be here.

It’s another party, another ball. He comes because he is invited, because he knows he has to shift the current climate of Alina’s reputation, has to convince the nobles and citizens and everyone in between that she is here to _help_ them, because she is. That she is here to make things _better_ , because she is. 

They are back in the Capital, now, having followed Nikolai back with new plans on what to do moving forward. Alina has two amplifiers, something that the other Grisha all seemed to think was impossible, and the Darkling is still out there. Nikolai suggests being allies, that having the Sun Summoner back in Os Alta will help move things politically, and so they go.

Mal and Alina haven’t seen each other for weeks. He’s been at balls, off at hunts, she’s been having meetings with the royal family, rebuilding whatever is left of the second army. But in doing so, she’s decided that the nobility of Ravka weren’t important enough for her to waste her time, because there is a war to win and other battles to fight. Mal understands this, in a way, but also sees the fault in it. The failing in her logic.

Without the support of the nobility, she will lose the support of the people. Without the support of the people - no matter how rich and out of touch they might be - they’ll be back to square one. The common folk, the folk like him, all believed in her. Now it was just a matter of the others. And yes, Mal knows - she’s a little awkward, a little antisocial, and a little hard to get to know. She does not do well at parties. But that’s what he’s for, isn’t it? 

The other Grisha she surrounds herself with aren’t exactly helping, either. There’s already enough issues between the common Ravkans and the crowd of super-powered beings in the Little Palace. The Grisha have their own teachings, their own way of life, and their own priorities. They were never _going_ to win over the hearts of the populace, locked away like they are. Ravkans were a suspicious people; they were quick to believe rumors and preferred to put their faith in people they liked to have around. Mal understands this, and understands how to shift that thinking, if given enough time.

Now he just needs to shift it in Alina’s direction - because she is going to need to win the hearts of these people, no matter what she decides to do for the country’s future.

( and no matter what he wants to do, no matter how much he’d rather be back out in that forest, on the run, he’ll stay. He’ll stay and help her. )

Because Alina deserves that. If he can’t be what she needs or wants in the end, he can at least get her somewhere where she _can_ get it, whatever it may be.

Nevermind how much that still _stings_. Things are complicated, and that is just part of growing up. He knows that, and knows that no matter what, he will _always_ love her. 

_But what about_ ** _in_** _love_?

He takes another long drink from his glass to push his attention back to the party, uncomfortable in his First Army uniform. It’s the nicest thing he owns, sure, and the party called for nice attire, but he’s so obviously out of place. He should have taken Lebedev up on his offer for a suit, considering this all feels a bit like he’s lying. 

“Oretsev!”

The feeling is instantaneous - the discomfort folds inward and the line across his shoulders fades. He doesn’t smile, necessarily, but that awkward, tense set to his jaw is gone. He looks the part, because that’s what he’s here for, and turns towards the voice to see four people approaching him - three fellow soldiers and a noble’s son. He’s seen them all at the underground fights, where soldiers and Grisha tested themselves against each other.

“You made it!” One of the soldiers - her name is Yelena - grins and smacks the back of his shoulder. She’s the second oldest child of an old Ravkan line. Her lack of a significant title has entirely to do with her rebellious nature, seeing as she’s done the time and has the experience to warrant one. Unfortunately, much to her parents’ dismay, she doesn’t care to play well among the other noble families. She’s good at close combat, better with a rifle, and has won her fair share of fights underground. She’s loud and boisterous, but Mal likes her well enough. “I heard Lebedev had asked you to come, but I didn’t think you’d show.” 

The other two are Pevel and Oleg- Mal doesn’t know if he’s heard either of them say more than fifteen words, but they are always at Yelena’s sides.

Mal shrugs, and Yelena laughs. 

“Don’t look so put out. These parties aren’t worth shit, but you can meet the right people if you need to. Here-” She turns, gesturing to the noble’s son who had been just outside the conversation, watching. “This is Igor Goncharov’s oldest, Mikael. Mikael, meet Mal.”

Mikael couldn’t have been more than eighteen, and despite himself, Mal feels the familiar pang of protectiveness. Like he’s back in the orphanage again, looking over the younger children. But that isn’t further from the truth, and in the acknowledgment of that feeling comes slight bitterness. How much money does Mikael’s family have? How much of that could actually _feed_ other Ravkans?

Still, Mikael smiles at Mal - a smile that is as nervous as it is...what? Giddy? It takes Mal a moment but he does end up recognizing the look, and- oh. Oh no.

“I’ve heard a lot about you, Malyen Oretsev. You’re-”

He needs to cut this off. Mikael is still smiling and Mal feels uneasy, wanting to either shift the conversation or simply leave. “Mal’s fine.”

“Excuse me?”

He’s tired, feels as though he’s been tired since he first arrived. He takes another drink. “You can just call me Mal.”

“Oh, of course. My apologies. _Mal_.” Mikael’s smile grows and Mal is fairly sure he sees the boy flush and saints above. He doesn’t have it in him for this tonight. 

“Mal is _Alina’s_ childhood friend, you know,” Yelena adds with a tone behind the words that Mal can’t decide if he likes or not. But it does good work in getting Mikael’s attention away from Mal, so he decides not to push it. “They’re from the same orphanage, and they were actually both in the First Army together, before-”

There is just enough time for Mal to realize where Yelena is going with that story, just enough time for the panic to rise, for the thought of interrupting begins to form, when another voice cuts in. Familiar. Tilted. Regal.

Mal feels both sick and furious all at once. 

_Nikolai Lantsov_.

“Mikael, it’s been _years_ since I’ve seen you last. You’re- oh saints, Yelena, what did you do with your _hair_?”

It’s enraging, really, how Mal knows that the exact tone of voice, the way he cuts in and distracts the entire group of them completely. The fact he _knows everyone_. Everyone. And can just slide into the conversation like he’s meant to be there. Mal doesn’t need to turn to know the Crown Prince of Ravka is grinning, looking all the part of the shining prince home in court at last and entirely too comfortable in what is most likely his blue royal attire, the Ravkan double eagle spread out across his chest. The thought, as it usually does, bubbles to Mal’s consciousness. _Punch him. Just once. Shut him up._

But it’s too late. It’s always too late. 

“ _My_ hair? You’re one to talk.” Yelena laughs again, reaching out and shaking hands. 

Nikolai’s in his red coat tonight, Mal realizes, so his predictions weren’t entirely correct. It fits him well, tight but not overly so across his shoulders. It makes him look taller, stronger, more in control. Not that he needs it. The thought of _I prefer the blue_ crosses Mal’s mind before he can stop it and he turns back to his drink.

Pleasantries are exchanged between the group - because of course, Nikolai knows them all. Of course, they’d all been under his command at some point, shared a post with him, had a meal. Mal feels the distaste grow in the back of his throat, so he takes another drink in hopes he can wash it down. He focuses on that- on how his cup is nearly empty and how he feels very sober. How he wishes the bar wasn’t so far away for him to grab another. And how he still, very much, doesn’t want to be here.

“—extraordinary, really. We’ve been working with the Sun Summoner on a lot of those same things. It’s too bad she couldn’t make it tonight, Yelena, I think you’d really get along with her.”

They’re talking about Alina. Mal’s eyes shoot back up just in time to meet Nikolai’s hazel ones, looking back at him. He feels the tension back in his shoulders, pulled as taut as a bowstring.

Yelena scoffs, but there’s very little actual disgust behind it. “Yeah, I’ll believe that when I see it.”

“You don’t _believe_ me? After all we’ve been through?” Nikolai’s eyes shift back to her, and he’s smirking - confident, with an air of amusement. “Fine, don’t. But I’m telling you. She’s not here because she didn’t want to be here, a sentiment I’m sure you share. You’re already more alike than you think.”

There’s some more chatter, more conversation exchanged, but Mal isn’t paying attention. Instead, he watches Nikolai speak - the animated way he goes about it, the ease at which he moves. He talks with his hands, yes, but it’s mostly just _him_. Cocky, arrogant, expressive.

“Oretsev.”

Mal blinks, coming back to himself in time to see that the group is dispersing, and that Nikolai is looking directly back at him again with a smile, smaller but a few striking ways much more genuine. There is a brief moment when the two of them simply watch each other, before Nikolai nods - once. Mal returns it, respectful despite it all, and they move in opposite directions back to the party. To the crowds of people who have too much power over the future of their country.

What their interaction had reinforced for Mal is that they simply have the same goal, and he can’t be sure if he’s thankful to have someone like Nikolai to help him sway the hearts of the wealthy, or if he hates him all the more for how much better at it he already is.

It’s a complicated twist of emotions, Mal knows that much, and when he turns to glance over his shoulder across the party he catches the fine line of Nikolai’s jaw. The arch of his nose. The golden sweep of his hair. Mal swallows, thickly, and turns back to push towards the bar.

Hate. Definitely hate.

  
  


**WEST RAVKA**

Mal tries not to think much about the events over the last couple of...well. He thinks it’s been months. 

It feels a bit like whiplash. From Sturmhond, to Os Alta, settling into the capital and figuring out a new normal all the while knowing the Darkling was still out there, somewhere. And then Nikolai’s birthday, the attack and the mass murder of everyone that had been left. The chaos, Alina, the complete destruction of the Little Palace. Mal is still trying to wrap his head around the _power_ he saw her use, then. About how she was prepared to let the entire place come down on her, just like that. It was a miracle they made it down underground in the first place, no matter how much they all grew to hate their lives down there.

Mal _especially_ hated the Aparat. Hated him in a way that was new and twisted within him. But even so he stayed, he helped. Alina needed to recover. She and the other Grisha all needed a moment to breathe, and no next move would come if they were still holding pieces of themselves together. But once they did have that time, and they did all come back together again, it was time to move.

There were tunnels out and a complicated combination of _maybe’s_ and _hopefullys_ and a lot of trust in a feeling Mal was just learning to understand. But with Mal and whatever gifts he apparently had, they might even have a chance to get out. No, not might. They _did_ have a chance. If he didn’t fuck it up.

It was a longshot to get to Nikolai in the first place, but where they were and what they had available to them, longshots were as good a chance as any. Mal didn’t like putting Alina and the other Grisha through this kind of work, through the act of simply _surviving_ when it felt like the universe itself was out to stop you, but he was good at that.

At surviving. At having something to do. He could lead them through the tunnels and he could get them up into the surface and he could keep them moving and (hopefully) safe. He could do _this_ , if nothing else.

And he wasn’t alone. He’d grown to truly trust Tamar and Tolya. Zoya and Nadia proved themselves many times over. Harshaw and Adrik and Genya and Sergi and even David, all of them soldiers. All of them worth fighting alongside, even if the party had been obnoxiously large for the task at hand.

( That was also when he started to see the way Zoya and Alina looked at each other. The way Alina’s expression shifted, ever so slightly, when the other Grisha’s attention was on her. He didn’t see it much, didn’t want to impose on whatever moment they shared when their eyes met, but he did see it. Curious, complicated, but then again wasn’t everything? 

And of course, there was the moment in moonlight. Alina, shroud in the low glow, looking all the part of sainthood. It took Mal’s breath away, but in a way that settled differently in his chest. It was Alina he saw, but it also wasn’t. _Sankta Alina_ was the glowing figure he saw then. Not _his_ Alina. Not the Alina he’d been in love with. This- this was a _saint_. A woman who could pull down the light from the sky, who could call to it at her will.

 _You’re glowing_. He’d told her.

_Oh. Oops._

He’d dropped her hand moments after, feeling almost burned. Alina Starkov. _Sankta Alina._ She was so different it almost hurt to look at her, so he turned away. 

_Be more careful,_ he’s said tightly, before he’d turned to address the rest of the group. But not without noticing how it was Zoya, who came to step into his place alongside Alina. Zoya, in all of her stunning curls and cool confidence, who looked like she _belonged there_. Two powerful, saint-like Grisha.

Mal felt like he understood. At least a little more than he did before. )

And as it happened more often than it didn’t, their luck ran out. 

They did make it to the surface, and they did have a next step in the plan. They had a small camp set up and they were all out doing their chores. Mal had stolen away to wash, a quiet moment alone before getting back to work to find Nikolai and his men. Before they had to get back to saving Raka.

But of course, Alina was there. Of course, things were still complicated. Mal had been _trying_ , he really had, but none of this was easy.

“I can’t do this. Not if you make me laugh, not if you touch me like that.”

“Mal—”

He shouldn’t have let Alina see the tattoo across his back. He thinks that maybe what he regrets most. But he couldn’t have known she’d turn around and he couldn’t have known she’d _stay_ and _ask about it_. But it had distracted him, for just long enough that by the time he felt and heard the attackers, they were too close.

He tries to dive for the rifle the second he can, but it’s at the same moment the voice rings out through the trees. 

“Hands above your heads.”

 _You put her in danger_. It’s the only thing he can think about. They had been safe, and now they aren’t, all because he—

“Put that down. Unless you want to see your girl plugged full of bullets.”

Alina is frozen at his side, and Mal judges how long it will take him to shoot that man first, then the other two. _You’re too slow_. With the three barrels trained at them both, Mal lowers his rifle to the ground. The three are wearing First Army coats, but not in uniform. These weren’t soldiers, at least not anymore, if the belts of bullets across their chests were anything to go by.

Mal tries to get between the man who’d spoken and Alina, tries to find some scenario where she could run and he could hold them off, but all of his ideas come up too short. The air is cold against his skin, and all he can hear is his own voice in his head - _stupid, reckless, this is your fault._

The man who had called out to them eyes Alina, before his attention turns back to Mal. “Come on over, nice and slow.”

Mal doesn’t move. “I need my boots.”

“Less chance of you running without them.”

Alina moves a little closer to Mal, and Mal frowns at the man. “What do you want?”

“You can start with answers.” The man is comfortable with the gun. More than a normal soldier would be, and that worries him. Either he’s trigger-happy or some kind of mercenary, and if he can’t find a way to get Alina _out_ , they’re going to lose their chance. The man gestures back towards town as he speaks. “Town nearby, plenty more comfortable places to hole up. So what are a dozen people doing hiding out in the forest? That’s right. I found your camp. You deserters?”

Mal can feel Alina tense, and he’s fairly sure he can feel her temper rising. Her protective streak over the other Grisha has grown tenfold in the last few months, and Mal wonders how far she’s willing to go for them. What she’s willing to do to keep them safe.

So he cuts in - smoothly, easily. “Yes. Out of Kerskii.” 

The man takes a step forward, and there’s a tug at the back of his mind. He can’t tell if it’s recognition from the convoy they’d seen earlier that day, or something else. 

“Kerskii? Maybe, but—” The pause is what does it, and Mal’s eyes widen just as Luchenko’s do as well. “ _Oretsev_?”

“Luchenko?”

It can't be that easy. He knows that. And yet seeing Luchenko grin almost gives him hope.

“All Saints, I haven’t seen you since your unit trained with me in Poliznaya.” Even now he hates the way it sounds like Luchenko is bragging. "This little pissant was the best tracker in ten regiments. Never seen anything like it. And now you’re the most famous deserter in all of Ravka."

There is a part of Mal that winces at that, even now. _The most famous deserter_. Not his favorite title, even if he’s come to accept it.

“Just trying to survive."

“You and me both, brother.” Luchenko gestures at Alina, then. “This isn’t your usual.”

Alina stiffens almost imperceptibly, in a very different way, so Mal cuts in again. "One more First Army grunt like us.”

“Like us, huh?” Luchenko isn't buying it, Mal can tell. He eyes Alina and Mal resists the urge to step even more between them. "Take off the scarf."

"Bit of a chill in the air." Alina isn’t as casual when she responds, and Mal feels whatever chance they might have fall away. Lunchenko might be brash and boastful, but he'd still been a decent soldier. He can probably read the way Alina isn't scared, like a normal grunt might be on the receiving end of three barrels, unarmed. But Mal doesn't blame her. She could probably kill them all in a single moment if she wanted to. 

Luchenko’s not impressed. "Go on, girl."

She looks back at Mal as if to make sure it's the right move, and Mal quickly moves through whatever other options they might have. But before he can speak up to stop her, Alina shrugs and jerks her scarf away.

Mal can see the recognition in Luchenko’s eyes from where he stands.

_The Sun Summoner._

A separate kind of feeling starts to well up in him. Alina the Saint, Alina the Sun Summoner. She could easily get them both out of here, and then the two of them could make a break for the trees. It would leave the rest of the Grisha to this band of mercenaries, yes, but it could _work_ and she could _be safe_ and there’s still too much of Mal that thinks _that would be enough_. 

“Heard you were keeping hallowed company, Oretsev. Looks like we caught ourselves a Saint…” Luchenko tilts his head a bit to the side, sizing Alina up. “Thought she’d be taller.” And then— “Bind them both.”

Mal turns to Alina with a look he hopes screams _do it, now_. If they are going to be able to escape, it has to be before she’s bound. He may not know much about Grisha powers, but he knows that much. Alina catches his eyes and—

Well. She holds out her wrists, and Mal doesn’t even try to hold back the sigh. Despite his hope, he’s not surprised by her choice. She’s thinking about the others, and of course she’s going to care more about their safety than her own. 

The woman - one of the other gunmen - ties Alina hands and then Mal’s. 

“Can I at least put my shirt on?”

She snorts. “No, I like the view.”

He doesn’t like the way she looks at him with her narrowed eyes and crooked smile, and from the way Alina is frowning, neither does she, but the woman finishes the knot and turns to lead them into the woods at gunpoint.

Luchenko is laughing, but Mal doesn’t really listen. He hears- “Life’s a funny thing, isn’t it?” and that’s about it. Alina is responding to him, trying to shift his thinking on offering her back to the Darkling, but Mal knows Luchenko. Knows how short-sighted he is and that any plan that involves more work on his part won’t happen.

They’re going to put them on the convoy and take them directly to the Darkling’s forces, _unless_ they can escape before then. 

The woman - he thinks he hears her name is Ekaterina, but he can’t be sure - is agreeing with Alina. Something about money and the Shu Han and auctioning her off.

“We aren’t ambassadors or diplomats.” Luchenko starts to explain. “The bounty on that girl’s head will buy us all passage through the border. Maybe I’ll catch a ship out of Djerholm. Or maybe I’ll just bury myself in blondes for the rest of my days.”

They enter a clearing, then, to find all the others circled up. Harshaw has been shot, most likely because he’d been keeping watch, and Tolya is bleeding. 

“See?” Luchenko preens. Mal is overcome with the urge to knock his teeth in. If he could get close enough to him, he can probably try. “With this windfall, I don’t need to worry about the highest bidder.”

Alina moves quickly to step ahead of him, cutting him off, and Mal knows she’s going to beg for their lives. That she’s going to do whatever she needs to do to keep them safe. It won’t work, but she is going to try, and Mal can’t fault her for that.

Mal keeps watching, looking for a broken link in the situation. They are surrounded, now, by about thirty of Luchenko’s men - maybe more, maybe less. There’s a chance that if they have the time to regroup, even while still captured, they could stage some kind of break when they get back on the road, but with Harshaw shot and the guns on the rest of them, it’s a tricky move.

Alina’s begging doesn’t work, and instead, Luchenko pushes past her into the clearing, addressing his men.

“Spy that collar? We have the Sun Summoner!” He calls out and there’s a resounding cheer as Mal and Alina are pushed towards the others. “So start thinking about how you’re going to spend all of the Darkling’s money.”

_Think, think, think. What—_

That’s when he feels it. A shift. Usually, his feelings don’t work as well with crowds of people as they do with animals. He can sense them, yes, but it takes more effort. More attention. But right now he feels movement, a settling of figures in the trees, and it’s not the birds who have come to surround them. 

They’re not alone.

“Why not ransom her to Nikolai Lantsov?” It’s a soldier, surely one of Lechenko’s men, somewhere off in the crowd. But Mal isn’t quite sure if that’s right, if it _is_ one of Lechenko’s men.

Luchenko snorts at the idea. “Lantsov? If he has a brain in his head, he’s rusticating somewhere warm with a pretty girl on his knee. If he’s even alive.”

“He’s alive,” another voice answers, but this time Mal _knows_ it’s not one of Luchenko’s. 

Something is happening, or about to happen, but _where_? He scans the crowds, not sure what he’s looking for. 

Luchenko shrugs. “Makes no matter to me.”

“And your country?” Alina sounds defiant, like she can’t believe a soldier of the First Army would care so little about Ravka. 

“What has my country ever done for me, little girl? No land, no life, just a uniform and a gun. Doesn’t matter if it’s the Darkling on the throne or some useless Lantsov.”

“I saw the prince when I was in Os Alta,” Ekaterina adds thoughtfully. “He’s not bad looking.”

A third voice chimes in now, and suddenly it all falls into place.

“Not bad looking? He’s damnably handsome.”

 _There_. Mal almost can’t believe his ears. After the sheer amount of time they’d spent looking for the blasted (almost) king of Ravka, after all the worry they’d carried that Nikolai could be _dead_ , here he is, settling right in the moment they need him most.

Luchenko doesn’t stand a chance, to the point Mal nearly feels sorry for him. Nearly.

“Brave in battle, smart as a whip.” The third voice continues, and Mal, once again where it concerns Nikolai Lantsov, can’t decide if he’s elated or annoyed. Is the monologuing necessary? Really? “An excellent dancer. Oh, and an even better shot.”

“Who—” A blast rings out before Lunchenko has the chance to finish. 

Alina gasps, bringing her bound hands to her mouth. Looks like she’s figured it out as well. “Imposs—”

“Don’t say it.” Mal mutters, already tired, before lunging towards Alina to get her to the ground. Gunshots erupt around them, and everyone reacts at the same time. The other Grisha aren’t bound, which means they all immediately fall into step, forming a protective circle around Alina, and he’s thankful for them. Really and truly.

A thud lands near the two of them, and Mal risks a quick look up to see _exactly_ who he expects to see.

Nikolai Lantsov, dressed in his First Army gear, looking obnoxiously and infuriatingly in his element. “What are you two doing barefoot and half naked in the mud?” He grins when he catches Mal’s eyes, and Mal feels something in his chest tighten. Embarrassment realizing just how undressed he is maybe, but he doesn’t think so. “Looking for truffles, I hope?”

Mal doesn’t have the time to respond with anything remotely sarcastic before Nikolai is reaching down to slash at the ropes at his wrists, giving him a nod before freeing Alina and pulling her to her feet.

“Next time I’ll try getting captured.” He continues. “Just to keep things interesting.”

Mal pulls himself to his feet in just enough time to see Nikolai toss an extra rifle his way. Mal catches it and loads it, turning towards the chaos and searching through the faces. This he can work with.

Nikolai’s voice rings out again, casual. “Shall we?”

“I can’t tell who’s who!” Alina sounds overwhelmed, but not panicked, and Mal knows it’s because she’s happy to see Nikolai. Thankful for the save, of course, but generally just happy to see him. It’s a feeling he’s regretful to admit he shares - a kind of buoyant hope that always seems to follow whenever Nikolai Lanstov arrives.

Mal lifts his rifle, aiming for the head of one of Luchenko’s men. He shoots. The man falls. He readies his next shot.

“We’re the side that’s hopelessly outnumbered.” Nikolai supplies, catching Mal’s eyes again and giving him a small grin before heading out into the fray himself.

What follows is experienced, organized chaos. Mal watches Alina join the other Grisha in pushing back Luchenko’s men - fire and wind and water and light. Nikolai’s men, as always, are comfortable in battle, though their numbers are - as Nikolai warned - few and far between. Mal takes down as many men as he can, jumping through to fight in the swell of things when he’s out of ammunition. There’s a moment he ends up bumping into someone and just before he turns to slam his rifle into their shoulder he hears Nikolai’s voice.

“We’ve got to stop meeting like this.”

There’s a slight enough pause in the fighting that Mal has time to glance over his shoulder to see him, the current only living heir to the Ravkan throne, and he’s struck by the sight. Nikolai’s grinning, he’s always grinning, but it’s more - the light in his eyes, the way he still somehow exudes the same charm and elegance with blood and dirt-streaked across his face as he does at a royal ball. 

Mal’s chest tightens again, this time uncomfortably so, and he turns his attention back to the fight.

“We need to get out of here. Your men aren’t going to last much longer.”

Nikolai is reaching into a pouch at his side, seeming to ignore Mal’s comment. He’s about to repeat himself when something is nudged against his arm. He takes it, looking down to his hands to see a small box of ammunition. 

“All in due time, Oretsev.” Mal hears the sound of Nikolai reloading his own rifle. “Haven’t you been paying attention? I always have a plan.”

Mal quickly takes the ammunition and reloads his rifle, thankful that Nikolai - apparently - had known just how much he needed the bullets. “Why don’t I believe that?”

Nikolai laughs. “You know, for being the head of a Saint’s personal guard, you have astonishingly little faith.”

There’s a yell from one of Nikolai’s men, and it pulls both of their attention away from the battle. There’s a filing outwards, movement to the field, and they meet eyes once more before Nikolai nods— “That’s our cue.” And he takes off in the direction of Alina and the other Grisha. Mal lets off a shot, and then another, taking down two of the men advancing on Tolya with Harshaw on his back, before following after them.

“What’s happening?” Alina asks just as Nikolai steps in behind her, like he’d been there the whole time.

“This is the part where we run.”

The lot of them take off into the trees, Mal keeping somewhat to the back but close enough to watch for anyone falling behind. The Grisha struggle to keep up - David, specifically, the weight of his pack pulling him behind because of course he has his pack - but they all manage. Especially thanks to Tamar, who darts back and forth across their path behind them taking out as many of Luchenko’s men as she can while keeping everyone together.

Alina stumbles, and Mal catches her elbow, keeping her on her feet and shoving her ahead a few steps so he can turn, shooting twice. Two more bodies fall and they keep running even as they break into a barley field, covered in mist despite the sun’s height in the sky. Mal has a sinking feeling Nikolai is going to pull something else unbelievable, and he realizes he’s hoping for it. Betting on it 

They all come skidding to a halt when Nikolai shouts “here!” Mal is confused, but they all seem to share the feeling. Then Nikolai turns, facing them all, and two high shrill whistles break out through the air.

 _Oh saints_.

“Hold on tight!” 

“To what?” Alina yells, looking desperately unsure. 

Mal opens his mouth to yell that they were all going to be dead if they keep sitting in the middle of this open field, but just as he’s about to say anything at all the ground beneath their feet begins to rise.

He needs a second to process that, really. The ground, the field itself, starts to _lift in the air_. 

They all seem to look up at the same time, seeing a massive craft above with an open cargo bay. It is a ship of some kind, he assumes, with sails at one end suspended under a large...is that a _balloon_?

“What the _hell_ is that?” He can’t help but ask.

“The Pelican,” Is what Nikolai answers with. “Well, a prototype of the Pelican. Trick seems to be getting the balloon not to collapse.”

“And did you solve that little problem?” He turns towards Nikolai, then, brows lifted. 

Nikolai gives him a smile, which Mal would call sheepish if it had been anyone but Nikolai Lantsov. “For the most part.”

The platform continues to rise, lifting higher and higher towards the ship, but not fast enough. Bullets start to ping against the underside of the platform, and Mal moves towards the edge, trying to take out as many of Luchenko’s men as he can.

“Let’s go!” Alina cries out, backing away from the edge. “Why aren’t we getting out of range?”

The realization must hit Nikolai at the same moment it hits Mal because when he turns, Nikolai is already looking at him, his face a mirror image of what Mal is feeling. 

Nikolai is the one to answer Alina, though his eyes are still on Mal. “They know we have the Sun Saint.” 

And with that, Mal knows what he’s being asked to do. Or, maybe it’s not asked. Maybe it’s ordered. Maybe, despite the fact he knows he has to do it, there never would have been a chance to argue. Not that he thinks to — there’s a job to be done, and he’s been picked for it. He nods to Nikolai, once, before picking up another pistol and nudging both Tolya and Tamar.

Alina panics. “What are you doing?”

Mal glances towards Alina before his eyes move back to Nikolai - as if to make sure this is what he wants him to do. The look he gets from Nikolai is all the answer he needs. 

To Alina, he offers: “We can’t leave survivors.” and then he dives from the edge of the platform. 

_I am become a blade_.

He likes fighting alongside Tolya and Tamar. He’s known that for some time now, but it is reaffirmed in this moment. They are both efficient, quick on their feet, and merciless in their task. Mal shoots until he runs out of bullets, and then he finds himself a knife. Blood spills over his knuckles, his fingers, his hands.

There is no way to know how long it takes, but the three of them keep working until there is no one left, and then Nikolai’s voice rings out again.

“Come on!”

A cable falls over the side of the Pelican and Mal secures it for the two siblings to get onto the platform. He’s breathing hard from the adrenaline, and the smell of blood is acrid and sharp. But it’s fine, it worked, they are all safe. Alina is safe.

Mal gives himself a moment of relief as he tucks his ankle and wrist into the cable, preparing to be lifted up. One more disaster avoided.

“ _Mal!_ ” Alina’s scream echoes across the field, and Mal has just enough time to turn and see the man advancing towards him, to put up a useless hand in defense, before a sharp beam of light cuts through. He watches the body fall away in two, and in looking back to the platform he sees Alina standing there, hands still glowing, and Nikolai beside her with eyes wide.

The platform shifts, and panic swells in Mal when he thinks Alina will tip over. Nikolai must have the same thought, as he jerks her back away from the edge and the twins pull Mal towards the platform and back over the edge.

Safe. Just like he said.

The ride back to...wherever it is they’re going isn’t quite long enough. 

Mal still feels pulled taut, sore from binds and the fight and the minor scrapes and bruises he’d received. He also feels unmoored, ungrounded, but that has more to do with the airborne nature of the Pelican than anything else. Definitely just the flying craft, and not at all the events over the last few hours of their day.

He keeps thinking about hearing that voice, echoing out across the heads of Luchenko’s men. Self-assured, confident, arriving in the perfect moment with a rifle in hand. Nikolai- privateer, prince, hero. 

Had it been a few months prior, Mal would have hated him all the more for it. The whole ordeal would have left a bad taste in his mouth, a combination of resentment and agitation. Now? Now he just feels grateful. Grateful that Alina is alive, that they survived the kidnapping, that Luchenko and all his followers were dead. The Darkling still doesn’t know where Alina is and the Grisha had made the journey and they were finally, finally out of the tunnels. They were safe. They were okay. Things were _okay_.

And Nikolai was grinning ear to ear and leading Alina across the dock of the Pelican. Part of him thinks that his jealousy is unfounded, but a larger part realizes it’s not. It’s just different. A very different kind of jealousy than what he would have felt months before.

He runs a hand across his face, lets out a breath. Right now, he’ll let himself rest. 

But of course, too soon, the ship begins its descent and everyone crowds to the railings like kids watching a parade, a kind of giddy excitement flooding through them. Nevermind the events of the last few weeks or hours, nevermind what still awaited them in the weeks ahead. And as they continue closer and closer to the hanger, they notice the three other vessels parked inside. The Kingfisher, another cargo barge, and a third - also sleek - with the name _Bittern_ painted along the side.

“It’s a kind of heron.” He finds himself supplying the group at large, answering a kind of confusion he feels build up in Alina and the others. At some point during the trip, someone handed him a new pair of boots and he pulls them on as he continues. “They’re smaller. Sneaky.” 

It still takes his breath away, the way Alina’s eyes light up at the information. A momentary grip on his chest before her attention moves on.

The Pelican comes to a less than graceful landing and as the crew all get to work, Mal waits with the others for the gangway plank to fall into place, filing off together. He watches the members of Nikolai’s crew (Tolya and Tamar included) working in near-perfect harmony, mimicking the thrum of movement and energy of the entire rest of the hanger. It feels a bit like a cog settling into place in an oiled, well-running machine. Impressive isn’t the right word for it, but it doesn’t quite encapsulate the feeling washing over him. But still - it’s the only word that comes to mind.

Alina apparently agrees with him. “Impressive.” Her voice has the same wonder that had been in her eyes moments before, tinted with the same fond amazement she always holds for Nikolai. A tone that Mal has grown familiar with, and realizes doesn’t bother him nearly as much as it used to. Or at all.

She shakes her head in disbelief. “How does he do it?”

Mal opens his mouth to respond, something along the lines of _don’t sound too impressed, his ego can’t take it_ before the man in question responds himself.

“Want to know my secret?” Because of course he is there. Of course he is waiting right out of their peripheral, prepared for the exact moment to lean in. To look too innocent, for his experience and standing. Too filled with youthful mirth. 

_This is the man who saved you. Who all but ordered you to kill those men. This man will rule Ravka, when this is all said and done._

Nikolai grins, looking between the two of them as if it’s some kind of dark secret but whispering loudly enough for the whole ship to hear. “I have a lot of money.”

Alina rolls her eyes, and Mal lets out a breath, needing to take actual effort to keep himself from laughing. 

“No, really.” Nikolai continues as he walks on ahead of them, gesturing out towards the crew waiting on the dock. “A _lot_ of money.”

He leads Mal and the Grisha up an iron box into one of the largest spaces Mal has ever seen. Nikolai explains to them how it had once been a pilgrimage site, then an observatory, then commandeered for something else entirely. It is truly stunning, really, and Mal feels like he loses himself a bit in the expansive room, the arched roof, the understanding that they are standing inside a mountain. 

The Spinning Wheel, Nikolai calls it, and Mal’s eyes move upwards - catching one of the columns and the design carved into it: the Hunter with his drawn bow. Alina is close to him, something that always has and always will bring him comfort, so he’s able to hear when she whispers:

“So much glass.”

“But no frost.” He adds, suddenly quite aware of the fact himself. How he’s still a bit cold, in his borrowed coat, but how the leather of his boots feel warm. How, despite the weather outside, he can’t see his breath.

David says something about heated pipes, and Nikolai joins in, explaining the intellect and planning that had gone into the construction. David’s mind is something Mal doesn’t, and never will, understand and he takes comfort in knowing he never will need to. But in watching David and Nikolai interact (paying less attention to what they were actually saying), the feeling of _other_ settles in once again. Alina, Genya, and Zoya move close enough for the conversation to continue, listening in or adding their own thoughts as Nikolai continues on about his grand plans, his masterful next steps, where he’s been since the attack. They come together like separate pieces of the same image. _A King’s Counsel_. 

Mal’s eyes hover on Nikolai for a second or two longer than they have any right to, noticing the lines on his face, the exhausted set in his shoulders, no matter how buoyant or loud his voice might be. The last he saw Nikolai was when the Darkling was attacking the castle, his own birthday celebration, as the Little Palace fell. 

He hasn’t stopped since that night, most likely. Probably hasn’t so much as slept through the night.

“Have a look around,” Nikolai tells them, and Mal shifts his attention somewhere else in the room before he can be caught watching. And that somewhere else ends up back to constellations on the columns - the Hunter again, then Shorn Maiden, the Beggar and Bear and Bursar. The Three Foolish sons. The Scholar. The craftsmanship alone is indescribable. He looks over them all, moving around the wheel until his eyes come - for a third time - back to the Hunter.

Over the last few months, it has become increasingly apparent what Mal’s role is in everything. And for a long time, he was fighting for that spot to at least be beside Alina, but there’s something about the image of the Hunter that settles firmly and a bit uncomfortably in his chest. That settles alongside that feeling of _other_.

It heightens the feeling he hasn’t really been able to shake. _Beznako_. A lost cause. It eats away at his stomach, feels it burn a little too warmly through his boots. Nikolai belongs here, the other Grisha belong here, _Alina_ belongs here. 

Mal? Does not.

It is in that moment he hears Nikolai’s voice cut through his thoughts. “-you and Oretsev can join me for dinner.”

He turns and sees Nikolai looking at him, and while he knows it isn’t the case - that Alina is standing right at Nikolai’s side and that the conversation was meant for her - he feels both like he’s intruding and that Nikolai had somehow, in some way, known what Mal had been thinking. 

“Thank you,” he says quickly, perhaps a little too quickly, before Alina can speak or Nikolai can continue. “But I should look into outfitting our expedition to retrieve the firebird.” 

It wasn’t so long ago that the idea of Alina being alone with Nikolai was not an option Mal was willing to consider. Not that long ago that any time he had looked at Prince Perfect’s face and inscrutable charm, and the urge to punch him overwhelmed anything else. Now, the idea of going to dinner with him and Alina, being in a _room_ with him and Alina, was just as, if not more, uncomfortable.

Nikolai catches Mal’s eyes, then, and Mal sees a question in them. Some surprise, some curiosity - it feels good to catch Nikolai off-guard, for once, but the pride of it falls short of the confusion and- saints, Alina is _upset_ with him, and Mal’s not prepared to defend the choice. So he holds Nikolai’s eyes a moment longer, hoping that at least Nikolai could give him this. If nothing else, just this.

The moment that passes feels like years - with Mal and Nikolai’s eyes on each other, reading each other, meeting somewhere in the middle of the battlefield. Mal’s sure Alina is going to speak up, sure that she’s going to counter him and make him come along, but then there is Nikolai, at the exact perfect moment, saving Mal once more. 

“Of course. I’ll send Nevsky to you when he’s done. He can help arrange your accommodations as well.” 

Mal doesn’t have enough time to let out the breath he’s been holding before Nikolai turns to face him fully, clapping a hand on his shoulder. The grip is firm, strong, and, in a way that Mal is not prepared to process, comforting. He smiles, bright and charming and perfectly in place once again, and Mal finds himself missing the honesty that had just been in those hazel eyes. 

“It’s good to see you, Oretsev.”

The smile Mal returns is genuine. It really, truly is. There is a kind of relief that comes with it, a shining moment of true gratitude for everything that had happened. To see Nikolai, yes, but to know that despite the horrors they’ve all dealt with, he stands firm. 

“You too,” Mal responds. “Thanks for the rescue.”

Nikolai’s eyes shift to something much more cocky, then. Playful. Mal wants to shove him away in the same way he would a fellow soldier. He’s heard stories of Nikolai’s time in the First Army, and it doesn’t seem so impossible that he’s won the hearts of the other men. “Everyone needs a hobby.”

“I thought yours was preening.” He doesn’t know where this is coming from - the ease in exchanging words, the back and forth. Nikolai’s hand is still on Mal’s shoulder and he’s surprised to find he doesn’t mind it. Doesn’t feel it’s that odd. Alina is standing right next to them both, watching the interaction, but Mal just gives Nikolai a look of fond exhaustion. Like he would a friend. 

_This is the next King of Ravka._

After another moment, Nikolai finally pulls his hand away, shrugging dramatically and sliding so effortlessly into a sly grin that makes Mal feel a bit like he’s falling.

“Two hobbies.”

As they clasp hands to say goodbye, Mal feels Nikolai’s tighten around his own. A quick squeeze, before he pulls away. Mal bows and moves off to join the rest of the group and the men under Nikolai’s command. The feeling of falling hovers for a few moments after, and Mal spends a measurable effort to keep himself from looking back, so he can’t be sure if that the turn in his stomach is, in fact, the feeling of Nikolai’s eyes on the back of his shoulders or if it’s just a trick of his mind.

Just his imagination, he’s sure.  
  
  


**THE SPINNING WHEEL, NORTH RAVKA**

Mal feels embarrassed watching the bumbling mess of a man his country puts - or put - so much stock in. He feels sick, thinking back on the mindless praise the people of Ravka gave him. The loyalty within the army. _Our King_. Now this man stands in front of the room with his wife barely holding herself together, and Nikolai - looking as close to violence that Mal believes he’s ever really seen him.

“She is a servant, Nikolai. I didn’t have to force her.”

Mal’s hands tighten into fists at his side. He knows very little about Genya, though more than he does of the others. She is Alina’s friend. A powerful Grisha. She’d been tortured and nearly killed by the Darkling. She is also the reason none of Alina’s letters ever reached Mal, and why none of his reached her.

And now she stands, head held high, in the center of the room. The center of attention, and the topic of discussion. On trial for treason, but more than that, as witness to the crimes done against her.

Mal wants to kill him. And maybe the thought itself is treason. Maybe he doesn’t really care. He can feel in the room that he’s not the only one, but Nikolai speaks before anyone can move, his voice rising high and firm.

 _This_ _is what a king is supposed to sound like_ , Mal finds himself thinking.

“Genya Safin, when this war is over, you will stand trial for high treason against this kingdom and for colluding with the Darkling against the crown.”

It’s not what they want to hear and Mal feels the energy in the room shift, feels the tension run through the rest of the Grisha. He also sees the King smirk, vile and self-righteous. The murderous urge bubbles higher, but again Nikolai continues, cutting through the air like a blade. Or a gunshot.

“Father, you are ill. You have served the crown and the people of Ravka, and now it is time for you to take the rest you deserve. Tonight, you will write out a letter of abdication.”

Shock courses through the room at the word - _abdication_. Mal, knowing very little of courtly laws, wonders if Nikolai can even do that. If it is really that simple. 

The King, possibly the most confused of them all, turns to his son and sputters unceremoniously. “I will do no such—”

“You will write the letter, and tomorrow you will leave on the Kingfisher.” There is no room for questions. Nikolai leaves no pause for interruption. It’s skilled, meticulously timed. “It will take you to Os Kervo, where you’ll be seen safely aboard the Volkvolny and across the True Sea. You can go someplace warm, maybe the Southern Colonies.”

Mal’s head is spinning as the conversation continues. He feels the very obvious separation, between the King and Queen, Nikolai, and the rest of them - and in that separation, a kind of helplessness. There is nothing here he can do, nothing any of them can do, except be prepared if the King turns on Genya. 

Which, as things continue, seems more and more likely.

“The Colonies?” the Queen gasps. Mal frowns at her tone. Would it be so bad?

Nikolai, who seems to agree with Mal’s internal thoughts here, looks tired. Like he is trying to appease a child. “You will have every luxury. You will be far from the fighting and the reach of the Darkling. You will be safe.”

The King doesn’t seem to agree. “I am the King of Ravka! This … this traitor, this—”

Mal tenses. Tolya and Tamar do the same. Genya does not so much as flinch, and Mal is genuinely impressed by that. This argument, this yelling, is because of her. About her. And yet she remains as cool and seemingly unaffected as the stone beneath their feet.

“If you remain,” Nikolai continues, patience waning. “I will see you tried for rape.”

The word breaks through the room like a second gunshot, ricocheting off the walls. 

The Queen is the first to respond, grasping and clutching a hand to her heart. And while Mal has always known this, the absolute disconnect between who the King and Queen think they are and the way the rest of the world exists is dizzying. 

“Nikolai,” she pleads. “You cannot mean to do this.”

Mal a familiar ringing in his ears.

But Nikolai - calm, collected, regal Nikolai - remains still. “She was under your protection, Mother.”

“She is a servant!”

 _Servant_. Like they are less than people. Like it doesn’t matter who she is.

“And you are a queen. Your subjects are your children. All of them.”

Mal can tell something in the King has snapped. He advances on Nikolai, but rather than making him look imposing or even threatening, he looks more like a child throwing a tantrum. “You will send me from my own country on so slight a charge—”

Tamar snaps in at that, and Mal isn’t the least bit surprised. They all feel like jumping in, like it would be worth the chance to move to step in between the King and Queen and Nikolai. None of them move, yet, but Tamar’s voice is firm. “Slight? Would it be slight if she had been born noble?”

“If she’d been born noble, he never would have dared.” Mal’s voice rises before he realizes he’s speaking, and when attention shifts to him at his words, he crosses his arms over his chest. Nikolai steals a glance towards him, then, and Mal lets their eyes meet. He means what he says and he will not back down from what he’s added, and part of Mal assumes that is what Nikolai’s look will ask of him. To step back, to stand down. Except that’s not what he finds.

Instead, something else passes between them - some kind of understanding - but Mal isn’t quite sure what it means.

Nikolai returns to the conversation at hand, his tone remaining firm. “This is the best solution.”

“It is not a solution at all! It is cowardice!” Spittle flies from the King’s mouth, and Mal feels a mixture of disgust and pity. He seems winded, and part of him wonders if Nikolai will win simply because the King’s heart gives out. Then he’s struck by the reminder that Tolya could do that with a single lift of his hand.

“I cannot put this crime aside.” A muscle in Nikolai’s jaw jumps, then. Mal just barely catches it.

The King’s face is red, completing the angry infant persona he’s taken on. “You have no _right_ , no authority. Who are you to sit in judgment on your King?”

It’s subtle, but noticeable, how Nikolai straightens where he stands. It couldn’t be more than a quarter of an inch, but he seems feet taller than the man next in front of him, and the whole room catches it. Seems to settle where they stand. 

“These are Ravka’s laws, not mine. They should not bow to rank or status.” And then, seamlessly, he gentles again, returning to the image of a son trying to appease a father. Mal doesn’t think the King deserves the look Nikolai gives him, but he guesses it’s not exactly his place to say. “You know this is for the best. Your health is failing. You need rest, and you’re too weak to lead our forces against the Darkling.”

The King, in turn, becomes even more enraged. “Watch me!”

The tension is back, stronger than before, and Mal feels the distinct shift in the air. Like a fight is going to break out and Mal needs to be prepared for it. But then he remembers the look Nikolai had given him, and he bites his tongue. _Not yet. Let him handle this._

“Father,” Nikolai says gently, but with a weight to each syllable - forcefully patient. “The men will not follow you.”

The tone is not lost on the King. “Vasily was twice the man you are. You are a weakling and a fool, full-on common sentiment and common blood.”

Nikolai flinches as if he’s been slapped, and Mal feels a wave rush over him. Of what, he’s not entirely sure - protectiveness? Rage? 

_How dare this excuse of a man, who can barely so much as stand—_

And again, Nikolai speaks before Mal can move. “Maybe so.” 

Mal’s eyes jerk back to Nikolai, who is standing firm despite the flinch. He looks wounded, but not down, and his voice remains all the steady confidence of a leader whose plan has already been confirmed. “But you will write that letter, and you will board the Kingfisher without protest. You will leave this place, or you will face trial, and if you are found guilty, then I will see you hang.”

Mal can’t help but feel impressed, and a little in awe. 

_This is our new King_. 

The King searches for any kind of retort he can muster while his wife sobs next to him. “It is my word against her’s.” Is what he comes up with as he gestures to Genya, but there is a kind of desperation in his voice that lets the entire room know that he has lost, and he is aware. “I am a King—” 

Alina steps in at that moment. She faces the King with the same kind of poorly-contained anger and protective fury that Mal has felt curling in his chest this whole time. But of course, it is Alina who steps up first.

“And I am a Saint. Shall we see whose word carries more weight?”

The King turns on Alina, and Mal _does_ react to that, taking two steps and reaching for the closest weapon on hand. 

“You shut your mouth, you grotesque little witch. I should have had you killed when I had the chance.”

Nikolai speaks before Mal makes it more than those couple of steps, anger exploding through the mask of his words. “That is _enough_.” Then he turns and gestures to the guards who Mal had completely forgotten were still in the room. “Escort my father and mother to their rooms. Keep them under watch and ensure they speak to no one.” When his eyes turn back to his father, Mal can see his frayed patience, his anger near to boiling over. “I will have your abdication by morning, Father, or I will have you in irons.”

The guards are upon the King and Queen in seconds, without question or hesitation. The point has been made.

The King, upon realizing this, snarls at Nikolai. “You are no Lantsov.”

It should be another slap, should cause more harm than the comment before had done. And yet, the words feel empty. Harmless. And in return, Nikolai tilts his head down in a bow. 

“I find I can live with that fact.”

Mal has a thought, in those passing few moments, that he should continue to watch the King. That he, and Tolya, and Tamar, and the rest of them should wait for the royal couple to actually leave the room before letting down any of their guards. This is not yet over, and there could be an attempt to escape, final words to be said, any and all manner of desperate last efforts of a man who used to believe he was impervious to law and harm.

He should be prepared for any and all of those possibilities. Should.

But instead, Mal watches Nikolai. The stiff way he continues to hold himself in place, the darkness to his gaze while he watches his parents be led to the door. He sees bits and pieces of him breaking through to the surface that he doesn’t think he’s ever seen before. Anger, pain, and something a bit colder. A bit more distant, but familiar even still. 

And maybe it’s foolish of Mal, to think he could steal those moments from Nikolai uninterrupted. Foolish, to assume Nikolai wouldn’t feel his eyes in the same way Mal has felt Nikolai’s. Because at some point, Nikolai’s attention does shift, and Mal soon finds himself meeting eyes with the Prince of Ravka once more. 

They stand like that for a moment, and then a moment more. Mal feels the time of it pass, and he is aware that usually - by now - one of them has broken this. Has turned and shifted focus on something else. But this time, Mal isn’t the one wishes for that person to be Nikolai, and instead he holds the look for a few breaths longer. Takes the time to focus on the other’s eyes. As usually, a feeling passes across the room between them. Similar to the one before ( _understanding_ ) but also a bit different. Less built up, less constructed, less royal command and more...honest. More maybe it’s not honesty. Maybe it’s something softer, something closer to a person, and less of a mask.

Because Nikolai may be standing in the front of the room in the same clothes and same stature that had, moments before, demanded their attention. He may be the same man that commands armies, that flies impossible- no, _improbable_ ships- who dives into action without care or worry and usually with very little plan.

Except for in this moment, it isn’t a man at all meeting Mal’s gaze, but a boy. A boy who just effectively exiled his own parents, leaving himself the only figurehead, the only voice, for a country at war. A boy, in a moment, lost.

Mal holds his gaze, unafraid by the fear that he sees in those brilliant and hazel from across the room itself.

That is when Mal hears the word - _ruined_ \- his attention is jerked back to the others, to Genya. The King has indeed decided to stop before her, still red in the face, and has said something. Something mal missed. He steps forward to get in between them, a second too slow he knows, but Genya raises a hand to stop him.

She meets the King’s eyes, chin held high. “Remember me when you board that ship, moi tsar.”

The King and Queen are quickly ushered out after a few more exchanged words, and Genya’s shoulders sag once the door clicks shut. The others step in towards her, trying to comfort her. David, especially, looks concerned in a way Mal has never seen before, but he supposes the moment calls for it. And it’s good, really, seeing the swell of support around Genya - the Grisha take care of their own. 

Feeling a bit like he’s watching something he’s not privy to, Mal turns back again to Nikolai to see his attention has turned towards the others - the group of people he has just sided with, over his parents. The people he has chosen over the King and Queen. 

But something is off about the way he stands. Something different to the tilt of his shoulders.

There is an urge, deep in Mal’s chest, to approach him. It’s the same urge that had pushed him to step between Genya and the King when he had spat at her, but this time towards the other side of the room. Towards Nikolai. 

Somehow, in the last few moments, he feels so much further away than just across the room. So much further, and suddenly much older. Like he’s aged decades from that flash of a boy Mal has barely caught. It strikes Mal just how much he wants to _help him_. Wants to cross the distance and shake him out of whatever has just solidified behind his eyes.

 _And what can you do for him? For a Prince? A_ **_King_** _?_

 _Something_. _Anything_.

It’s a ridiculous thought, embarrassing almost, so he shoves it away. Except that when he focuses again, it’s just in time to see Nikolai noticing him staring. His expression shifts into a passing look of surprise and a bright kind of heat rushes up Mal’s neck. He doesn’t linger and instead turns back to see Genya and David kissing. Really, truly kissing.

Mal clears his throat.

The tension that had been smothering them all clears from the room, and he can hear Alina’s laugh. He wants to comment about how the two of them should find a room and hopefully add to the easier tone but Nikolai’s voice cuts in - crisp and clear. Still the politician. Now the King.

“Do not think to rest easy, Genya Safin. When this war is over, you will face charges, and I will decide whether or not you are to be pardoned.”

Genya bows, elegantly and with the experience of a woman who knows court. Who knew exactly how this worked. “I do not fear your justice, moi tsar.”

Mal isn’t sure he sees it or if he imagines the tension shoot through Nikolai’s shoulders. 

“I am not the King yet.”

“Moi tsarevich.” She amends.

Nikolai exhales, looking exhausted but deciding not to press it, and waves them all towards the door. “Go.” Mal sees the way Alina hesitates, he almost does the same, but Nikolai reiterates his point. “All of you.”

And so they do, heading for the doors together. And just as the doors come to a close behind them, Mal takes one last look over his shoulder to see Nikolai - all crafted bravado and excellent showmanship - slump into the chair at his drafting table, his head in his hands.

**THE SPINNING WHEEL, NORTH RAVKA**

Mal doesn’t see what Alina sees, not really. He’s too far away to see the details - the nichivo’ya are blocking the space between him and where Alina hovers over Nikolai’s crumpled body. Tossed to the side like some kind of doll.

Not ten minutes prior Nikolai had been standing proud, shoulders back, promising lands and title and rewards for their work. They were out on the deck of the Spinning Wheel, with the cold air and mountaintops around them. They’d been making plans, things had been looking up. There was a chance for them all to fight back and to win against the Darkling and the future had, actually, looked hopeful.

And then their luck had run out, again.

The Darkling has found them. Somehow, some _way_ , he’s found the Spinning Wheel. He’s managed to get past all of their defenses. He’s _here_.

And now, Mal is straining to see where Nikolai is, only to see the fear in Nikolai’s eyes. Watching him cough, then lurch forward, tearing at his uniform. He rips the clothing off and Mal can see it, even at this distance, the dark spindles snaking out under his skin. Mal’s eyes widen as the rest of the chaos of the hangers dulling around him. Alina is sobbing, crouching in front of where Nikolai turns, hands poised like there is something she could do. Alina reaches back to him, trying to help calm him down. Somewhere above the noise, Mal can hear the trembling in his voice. 

“A-Alina?”

Mal’s chest nearly shatters at the helplessness and confusion in his voice. All of the bravado, all of the confidence, shatters around her name. Mal hears Alina’s voice too. 

“ _No, no, no_ -”

And that is when Nikolai screams.

Or no - that’s not quite right. Because there is no way Nikolai could make a sound that corrupted. That animalistic. That _inhuman_. 

_Do something. Do something. Do something_.

But Mal is frozen to the spot, eyes wide as Nikolai continues to transform into something else. Something twisted and wrong and born of the Darkling. Mal has a rifle in his hands, there are screams all around him, he needs to _act_ , but he can only watch. Watch, as Nikolai’s body breaks and wings of shadow erupt from his spine.

It’s not even a second - barely a half-second - that Nikolai looks past Alina and catches Mal’s gaze. He feels the fear wash over him as he watches everything he’d ever known Nikolai to be come crumbling apart in front of him. Nikolai turns back to Alina and says her name again, one last pleading word, and when he blinks his clever, obnoxious, arrogant hazel eyes go fully black.

 _Shoot him_. 

Alina stumbles backward as Nikolai snarls and snaps towards her, his mouth now full of fangs, his fingers claws. He nearly catches Alina in his mouth when he does so, and Mal is aware that Alina is in _danger_ , but he still can’t bring it in himself to move. The King is Ravka is more darkness than man, and Mal knows that. The Darkling has corrupted him, has completely ruined him. Has taken the very last chance that Ravka had, and shattered it in front of their very eyes.

_He’s a monster. There’s no going back._

“Hungry?” The Darkling’s voice rises above the noise, tilted and self-assured. A man reaping the chaos he’s sewn, if he could even be considered a man. “I wonder which one of your friends you’ll eat first.

 _Shoot him, or he’s going to kill Alina_.

Alina, who is still somehow kneeling in front of Nikolai, still watching him like he might come to his senses. Her hands are raised - thank the saints - and Mal knows she’s ready to protect herself, if necessary. If she can do it.

 _Do it, so she doesn’t have to_.

She says something, but Mal misses it, and Nikolai pulls away from her. There’s expression across his face, pain and agony and a kind of fight that Mal feels deep in his gut. He’s fighting this, he’s trying.

_But will he win?_

Nikolai rips his eyes, now entirely black, away from Alina back towards where Mal is still standing, still frozen to the spot, and an understanding hits him so hard it nearly takes Mal off his feet. It’s a different kind of feeling than what Mal expects to feel looking at Nikolai. There are no puzzling looks to depict, no hidden messages to parse out. No- this is a feeling that Mal is _familiar_ with. It’s the feeling that Mal gets out in the woods, on the trail of his next target. Something primal and indescribable, a feeling that is entirely the reason he and Alina are still Alive today. Usually, that feeling is leading Mal through an otherwise hidden trail, or towards an animal, or letting him listen in to the needs of the forest itself. Usually, it’s tied directly to the _earth_ \- the creatures and the woods and the ground itself. 

In this moment, when he catches those black eyes, his gut tells him something else. Something new. 

_He’s still in there_.

Nikolai shrieks, again, and takes to the sky - removing himself from the situation before...before what? Before he can’t hold back anymore? Before he lost the last of the control he has? Mal feels like an empty shell, watching Nikolai disappear into the dark of the skies, before Alina’s guttural, furious cry brings him back. He sees her using her powers on the Darkling, a kind of anger gripping her that Mal hasn’t ever seen. It terrifies him, in a way, but he hears her scream _fight me!_ And that is all he needs.

He lifts his rifle, taking aim at the closest nichevo’ya, and fires.

**SIKURZOI MOUNTAINS**

Alina is upset. 

Mal watches her stalk off, knowing that she wants time alone. He’s seen the look enough, knows that the way she jerked away from him, pushed passed and walked off into the woods, was her lashing out. He doesn’t respond in kind and follow, like he would have not that long ago. Instead, he just turns and watches her walk away, trying to wrap his head around everything going through her head.

Baghra’s death had been a shock to them all. There’s dull pain in his chest when he thinks about it. Not necessarily because he will miss the old woman, he’d hardly known her, but for the pain he’d heard in Alina’s voice, even in the Darkling’s. The rest of the Grisha seem devastated just at the thought of her gone. She was important to them all. They looked to her like a mother, a teacher, a guiding light. He knew that. 

But it also had worked. Her sacrifice had saved them. And Mal respects Baghra the most for that, he thinks.

He should let Alina grieve. He should leave Alina to her moment.

Then Mal sighs, setting down the bag of grouse and turning on his heel. He knows Alina. Knows that she plans on finding a place to hide somewhere in the trees to let herself fall apart. Alone. Part of him follows after her because he wants to be the one there to help her, to take some of that weight she’s trying so desperately to carry on her own. Another part worries what might happen to her alone like that. That second part is a little irrational, he realizes, after what just happened at the Spinning Wheel, he’ll let himself be a little irrational to keep her and the others safe.

It’s not long before he catches up to her, but he keeps far enough back not to be seen.

She comes to a stop in a clearing, and Mal does as well. The stop is in reaction to something else, a sound up in the trees. And when Mal follows Alina’s eyes, he can see what caught her attention - a shadowed figure in the branches, large dark wings, black eyes.

Nikolai. He’s been following them. He’s been following them this whole time and _Mal hadn’t noticed_.

Nikolai’s more changed, now. Where boots had been are now clawed feet, bird-like in how they clutch at the bark. The darkness has spread from his arms down his chest, and around his mouth and hands Mal could just make out the glimmer of dried blood.

Mal’s stomach drops. He’s fed. Somewhere in the towns they’ve crossed, Nikolai has killed someone. Eaten them.

He watches Alina closely, and Mal’s fingers itch for his rifle. This moment has given him a second chance to end this, and he needs to take it. These kind of opportunities don’t just _happen_. And above all- the blood on Nikolai’s hands is because of him. Because he didn’t act quick enough.

_Alina is in danger. He could kill her right now, and what would you do? What_ **_could_ ** _you do?_

“Nikolai?” Alina whispers, but it carries through the air enough for Mal to hear.

The creature in the tree flinches, as if burned by the sound of his own name.

“Nikolai, wait-” Alina is reaching for him, trying to get him to stay, and Mal feels it too. The pull towards him, to not let Nikolai leave again. Part of Mal realizes it’s tied to that same feeling he’d had before, when Nikolai had taken off after the Darkling had done this to him. The feeling that has kept Mal up most nights so far. He has to do _something_ , but before Mal has time to react, Nikolai takes off to the skies, the branches shaking in his wake.

Mal watches the branches shudder, and hears Alina’s scream. Of frustration, of pain, of grief. He feels it down to his core, like the sound had come from him, fed through her and given air. And once the silence around the sound settles, he stands there for some time, letting Alina sob paces off from him, his eyes still upwards.

And despite his fears - the real, logical fear that Nikolai could tell the Darkling where they all were. That he had failed, in not realizing they’d been followed. That Nikolai could easily, simply, descend upon their camp one night and there’d be little they could do to stop him. That this meant twice, _twice_ , Mal hadn’t been able to take the shot. That they were all in grave, terrible danger out here in these woods.

Despite it all, that one thought still grips him. Wholly and completely and solidly.

_Nikolai is still in there._

  
  


**SIKURZOI MOUNTAINS**

He almost doesn’t tell her.

There’s an hour, possibly a bit more, before the sun will reach the horizon. The night before had gone on longer than it should have, with each of them needing the exhale, the break in tension. They’d laughed, told stories, enjoyed each other’s company. It was nice, really. Even if, the entire time, Mal knew what he had to do.

They’d all fallen asleep easier that night than the ones before. Nadia and Tamar were curled around each other, Tolya propped close to where Adrick was sleeping. Zoya was pulled into a tight ball, her hair around her face. Mal had noticed the way that Alina seemed to watch her a little longer after Zoya had fallen asleep. It was the same way that Mal used to look at Alina. The same way he’d looked at Zoya, too, for a short while. He knows something has been going on there, and he understands it a little better, he thinks. The way the two of them have drifted together. And even Alina had eventually fallen asleep, just close enough to where Mal was sitting that he could feel the warmth from her back.

There is a version of this story where he stays with her. Where he could lead them to Dva Stolba in the morning, help them search for the firebird, and keep them all safe. Maybe that’s the better choice, the better story. But as he finishes packing his bag and allows himself a moment longer to watch the slow rise and fall of Alina’s breathing, he knows that story isn’t his. Not anymore.

When the Grisha will wake later that morning, they will all have to choose where they are going and how. Alina has a plan, he knows she does, and it is a good one. Her’s usually are. There is a part of him that is still struggling with this image of the girl he’d known changing into something wholly, completely different. The girl who he used to watch trip over herself every time she suited up to travel is now The Sun Summoner, Leader of the Second Army, a _saint_.

And somehow still, through all of that, Alina Starkov. 

She is what is holding them all together. An image of hope, rising above the horizon. That familiar, angry, selfish side to him says he shouldn’t leave. Even now, even when he’s made his decision, the voice is loud enough. Telling him that his place is here, beside her. 

_I am become a blade._

It would be easier to stay, just as it would be easier if he had left moments before. But in those seconds he spares watching her, Alina shifts and her eyes flutter. And then she is awake.

“Mal?”

His finger goes to his lips, shushing her momentarily as he makes sure none of the others have stirred. They do not move, not even Misha, who had been curled against his legs for most of the night. When his attention returns to her, she’s frowning, recognition and understanding of what is happening flashing across her eyes.

“I’m going to find him.” He barely whispers, just loud enough for her to know what he’s saying. When her brow knits in confusion, he continues. “He was here last night. We both saw him.”

Nikolai. Her eyes widen and she moves to sit up, and Mal doesn’t need to hear her voice to hear the _I’m coming with you_. He shakes his head, setting a hand on her shoulder.

“They need you.” He motions towards the others. “Now more than ever. Continue with the plan. Take them to Dva Stolba.”

“What about you?” The set to her jaw is familiar. Alina is digging in her heels and a kind of fondness wells in Mal’s chest.

“I’m the best chance we have at finding him. We both know that.”

“And the firebird?”

He squeezes her shoulder, once. “I will be gone for six days and six days only. I’ll be back to help look for it, but you know where to start.” Alina doesn’t agree with him, and for a brief moment, she looks just like the girl he knows best- his best friend, his other half. Frustrated, stubborn, wanting to do the right thing. He almost smiles. Almost. So he continues. “You know as well as I do that Ravka can’t survive without him.”

 _That_ she can’t help but agree with, and she doesn’t like it, a muscle tightening in her jaw. “And when you find him? You saw what the Darkling did to him. What he is, now.”

Phantom pains shoot across his back, his chest, his arms. They both know what creatures born from the Darkling could do. They both had scars to prove it.

But he thinks back on that feeling. On seeing his eyes. Nikolai is in there, he _knows_ he is. Just like how he knew where the sea whip would be, just like how he finds Alina time and time again. Just like he knows anything else. 

“I’ll be fine.”

“Mal, that’s not-” Her voice rises slightly and Mal notices a twinge of...what. Authority? To the tilt. He shushes her once more and she presses her lips together. “I don’t like this idea.”

“Six days. It won’t push back the plan any. Go ahead, see what you can find about the firebird.”

“How will you find us?”

He looks at her and blinks once, the answer obvious, and Alina lets out a defeated breath. _I will always find you._

“I still don’t like this idea.” she mutters.

Mal thinks about telling her to order him. Thinks about saying _tell me to stay_ in the same tone he’d told her to _tell me to leave_. She has the power if she wants to use it, and Mal waits to see if she will. Instead, she tilts forward, wrapping her arms around him and tucking her face into his chest.

And again, he wraps his own arms back around her, squeezing tight.

“Come back to me.” She whispers into his chest. It tightens his ribs, rattling somewhere amid the knowledge that this is his selfish side, this is the part of him that has nothing to give her. _There’s a difference between wanting and deserving_.

“I will.”

Alina pauses, but only briefly, before adding- “And bring him with you.”

A few more minutes pass before Mal leaves before the others wake. Alina assures him it’s fine, she’ll deal with them, she has it handled - but she doesn’t look convinced. All of Mal has him questioning himself. If this _is_ the right thing to do, if he’s making the right decision. If he ever makes the right decision.

But his gut continues to pull him back to the forest, back towards wherever Nikolai took off to. Towards the _feeling_.

He doesn’t even know how this all works, really. He was taught the basics of tracking, same as everyone else. There were no spectacular teachers, no ancient wisdom. It was a lot of _look here, don’t step here, can you see that?_ And over time, yes. He looked there and he saw that. He also saw all those other things that the instructor hadn’t, had gut feelings leading him directly to the animals they were trying to hunt, knew when and how to hide. He exceeded well at scouting missions, at finding food, at tracking and scavenging and surviving. He did not manipulate the winds, or the seas, or the sky itself, but could work within them. Sense, within them. 

Most assumed he was just lucky. That he was just good at his job. But then the Darkling, himself, had turned to Mal and said _you will find this_ and, well, he did. Twice. Two legendary, mythological creatures he hadn’t even been sure existed until their carcasses stood at his feet. And it would have been a third time, possibly still might be, if the others don’t find the firebird first. 

He was no Grisha, he knew that. He had good feelings and he acted on them at the right times, but it was nothing compared to what Alina, or Zoya, or Tolya did. But it’s what Mal has, in this moment, so he takes a leap of faith and takes off into the woods without much of a plan, feeling - somewhere in his gut - that he’s moving in the right direction. That those broken branches way up near the top of those trees weren’t made by the wind, or the oncoming winter. He told Alina six days, which means he now has a deadline.

Six days to track down, subdue, understand, and possibly cure or find a way around, and then return Nikolai Lantsov. Without being seen, found out, taken by Shu bandits, the Darkling’s army, or otherwise be incapacitated. He doesn’t even know _what_ Nikolai has turned into. The creature that had been following them and had found Alina looked disturbingly, terrifyingly _almost human_ and not, both at once. 

Mal had made eye contact with him for barely a half moment, not long enough for a full breath, and he’d known. 

It was him. Nikolai. Of course it was. The look in those eyes had been terrified, twisted, darkened and panicked, but _Nikolai_. Mal hates, still, the way it twists at his chest. The creature didn’t even _look_ like him, but Mal has known. Instantly. 

_What does a king have to be terrified of?_

That isn’t even breaching the topic of what he’s supposed to do when he finds him. It’s easy to sound confident and sure when you’re reassuring someone else. Alina had been so terrified, so of course Mal could put on a face. Act confident. He’ll figure it out. That’s all they can do. But without Alina there to put on a face for, the reality of it weighs on him as he walks.

The thing that had approached Alina obviously had some control, something other than the instincts to destroy. To eat. It had held back, stilled itself, and run away when things got too tense. When it should have attacked, fought back, gotten violent - it had run. But that also had been around Alina, who Nikolai _had_ feelings for. Who he had already _proposed_ to her, days after even knowing her. It makes sense that if Nikolai had any agency over his instincts, he would hold back for her. If it was only his instincts, his guttural urges, that were moving him, it made sense. 

But where did that leave Mal? 

He takes a breath and crests over a hill, looking further into his wooded surroundings. Logically, there is no physical way he should be able to find a single creature in an endless span of forest and trees that make up the border of Ravka. No way this should even work. 

“Alright, Not-Yet-King of Ravka. Where are you hiding?” he says to no one, under his breath, to the lands out in front of him. 

**SIKURZOI MOUNTAINS**

It takes Mal well into that first night before he gets his first clue that he’s following anything at all. 

Carnage. Busted and broken corpses of large game. A closer look reminds Mal of his service in the First Army, of finding a deer that a young wolf had brought down. Inexperienced, uncontained rage. Power. Destruction. This is what Mal expects to find. He’s seen what nichivo’ya can do to a person, he’s felt first hand the shredding powers of those claws. Following a creature that the Darkling has corrupted, this is what Mal should find.

Though - maybe not exactly. If he was really following a _creature_ , the corpse slowly rotting away in the clearing would be human.

 _Maybe_ \- no. No he can’t hope just yet. He can’t let his guard down.

He continues tracking, coming across familiar and unfamiliar patterns. Mal’s gut turns the closer these tracks lead him to the nearest town, and then it rightens again when they lead away. From the pattern, Mal assumes Nikolai wants to go into those towns. He gets closer and closer to people, civilization - if the small villages that dot the borderlands even count as that. But then, as soon as he almost gets close enough to be seen, he takes off with fervor and desperation back to the forest. It’s a curious pattern, but a pattern all the same, and with enough time and with this knowledge, Mal has something to work with. Something to plan with.

It takes him into the next morning before he catches sight of it. _Him_ , he reminds himself. _You are hunting Nikolai Lantsov, not an it._

They are only a brief glimpse - a weight in the trees, an ear-shattering screech, and a dark shadow crossing the sun overhead. He gets close, almost too close, and a thought settles heavily in his chest. _He knows you’re following him_. And then the creature takes off back into the trees, back out of sight. 

He’s faster in flight than Mal can hope to be on foot. Nevermind the forest floor, the trees, the unpredictable ground. Mal tries anyway, for those first few times he catches up to Nikolai, trying to run after the shadow of the beast before he stops out of embarrassment more than anything else. 

He keeps walking, finding echoes of Nikolai in the forest floor. Tracks that bring him back close to the edge of the forest, near a farm, before he’s drawn away again. He spends a few more hours like this, walking and walking, when the thought comes to him, feeling a bit like water dripping down his back. Like a chill down his spine. 

_If he knows you’re following, why hasn’t he left? He’s trying to keep you close. Trying to draw you out. But why?_

Mal swallows, because he knows why. Why else would a predator play with its prey? He has to find a way to get the upper hand, here. He can’t be a few steps behind, each time. Mal slows to a stop, eyes searching the skies.

_Let him come to you, instead._

It’s a risk - Mal knows that - but there’s little chance he’s going to catch up by chasing Nikolai on foot. He’s got to draw Nikolai _to_ him. And then - well. He’ll figure that out when he comes to it. 

So Mal stops - it’s mid-afternoon by this point, and exhaustion is starting to pull at his limbs. He needs to figure out what he’s doing for dinner, for camp, for the next few days. 

He finds a safe enough spot to sleep, taking his time and making a lot of very unnecessary noise when he starts setting up. He’s making himself bait, in a lot of ways, and that knowledge keeps a steady stream of anxiety coursing through him. No matter how much he tries to reason it out, the facts keep coming back to him - whatever the Darkling did, that was a monster, just like the nichivo’ya, a _thing_ that has nearly killed Mal on multiple occasions. The same creature, or something close enough, that had created the very scars across his chest and back. That had brought him, and Alina, into this mess in the first place. 

But then he reminds himself that there is _some_ intelligence there. That he saw it, he _felt it_. Nikolai is still there, and he needs to find a way to pull him out. 

Mal makes camp. He hunts for dinner. He starts a fire. It hits him, somewhere along the way, just how lonely it is. And maybe it’s more stark now, after spending so long shepherding so many others. The last few weeks, _months_ even, have been around so many other people ( _friends_ ) that it’s almost as if he’s forgotten what it’s like to just have it be him around the fire, the spoils of his tracking cooking in the flame, and the silence of the forest around him. 

Until it’s not silent anymore. 

He doesn’t know when he knows for sure he’s not alone. One moment, it is just him, and then the next it is not. Mal knows the difference between darkness, and fuller darkness. He’s been tortured and held by the Darkling himself - and in that comes a kind of experience. There’s a deeper, heavier quality to the air.

There is an instance, a single moment, that he feels terror grip him. He calculates how far away his rifle is, how long he will have before he’s overwhelmed by the force of the monster. But then the moment passes, and Mal is more aware of the fact that any other creature under the control of the Darkling would have already attacked by now. That there would be no time to calculate in the first place. And somehow, that thought is comforting.

The same feeling claws at his gut as it did before, when he watched Alina approach the trees, nervously, reaching a hand out. He hears Alina’s voice in the back of his head - _Nikolai? -_ and then, as if it were a wave breaking over the shore, the anxiety washes away. 

It’s stupid, of course it’s stupid, but Mal isn’t afraid. 

He looks up from his fire and across the camp - just out of the circle of light - is a figure. Hunched, tense, frozen and tethered to the shadow. He can make out the claws, the wings, the dark, reflective eyes. Different from the Darkling’s creatures Mal has fought before, but not completely so. 

The two of them watch each other, the air growing tense. 

And then, without warning, Mal pictures the curved spine of the prince, hunched over a desk, bending under the weight of his crown. He sees a young man, grinning ear to ear, as they first watched the Kingfisher lift high into the air. He sees Nikolai, insufferable, frustrating, annoying Nikolai - full of endless, sourceless willpower. Optimism. Hope.

Nikolai, _who is still in there somewhere_.

He also pictures the absolute terror in Nikolai’s face as he watched himself turn. As he looked to Alina in desperation, and then lifted his gaze to Mal. He feels the overwhelming helplessness, the overpowering powerlessness, as he took off into the night sky. The Darkling’s voice, echoing, haunting.

_I have regretted many things I’ve had to do in this war. This will not be one of them._

Mal keeps still, holding his eyes to the figure just outside the light. He doesn’t want to move, to risk scaring Nikolai off, so for a good few moments, they simply stand and watch each other. Then the fire cracks, one of the logs breaking under it. The moment is gone, and Mal realizes it half a moment too late, standing quickly. 

“Wait—“

But Nikolai is gone, and Mal is left alone to the forest for the rest of the night.

**SIKURZOI MOUNTAINS**

From that morning on Mal isn’t sure who is actually following who. For every moment he believes he is tracking and finding clues to lead him to Nikolai, he senses the movement of something following _him_. It’s uncomfortable, yes, but more frustrating than anything else. He needs to get close enough to have some kind of interaction and this two-way game of cat-and-mouse isn’t getting either of them anywhere. 

He spends the better part of the third day trying, and failing, to come up with some kind of plan. It weighs on him, how half his time has already passed and how little he knows about what is going on with the others. Has the Darkling found them? Has he found Alina? What if this whole idea is just a waste of time? What if that hunch he’s depending on - that Nikolai can be _saved_ from this and return to his crown - is all futile? 

What if there’s no Ravka left by the end of this to lead? 

These, as well as a few other, much darker thoughts haunt him through the evening. And then, before he even realizes it, night has fallen and he’s sitting at a fire, waiting. 

The feeling isn’t as surprising, this time. While he doesn’t hear Nikolai approach, he does feel - the same way he feels about all of this - that something is _there_. Like the woods themselves are letting him know what to be aware of. This time, when the figure slowly and stealthily moves through the brush, Mal is waiting for him - face impassive as he stares into the space the creature enters, just outside of the fire. The tension is different, too, this time. Mal feels more in control of it. 

He gives it a moment to settle, for the two of them to watch each other just like the night before, when Mal speaks.

“Hungry?”

There is a rabbit roasting over the fire, the smell of cooking meat heavy in the air. It’s another risk, breaking whatever this silence might be, but he has to take it. And if the fact Nikolai doesn’t immediately turn and actually seems to lean closer, attracted by the smell, is anything to go by - it’s working. 

“I have extra if you want some.”

Silence, but _saints_ if the air doesn’t feel thick with want. A kind of barely restrained violence. Mal’s rifle is tucked right behind him, one quick movement away from use, but he doesn’t want it to come to that. 

Nikolai doesn’t move, despite how much he obviously wants to, and Mal feels himself grow impatient. 

There are a few more moments of silence, of that held breath, before Mal decides to take the silence as a yes, Mal moves to reach slowly towards the fire. He uses a knife to peel off a piece of meat, making deliberate movements to hopefully ward off any possible suspicion. Once carved, and when Nikolai doesn’t seem spooked by it, Mal holds the piece out. 

“Here.”

He swears, _swears_ , the creature steps closer. That it begins to work. But something changes and a low, threatening sound echoes out around him. His instincts immediately kick into gear, and it takes effort to keep from reaching for the gun. 

_Not yet. Just a moment longer._

Nikolai watches Mal, black eyes narrowing, suspicious. Mal tries to hold steady, tries to remain neutral, but his impatience grows and grows until he just can’t take it anymore.

“Your highness, just let me—“

It’s the wrong thing to say. Mal realizes that the second it leaves his mouth. The tension in the air breaks in the wrong direction, and he knows - without a doubt - that Nikolai is going to run. So Mal stands, quickly, like he could somehow reach out and pull back that almost-agreeable air between them again. 

“Wait!” 

But it’s too late. Nikolai is already moving back into the trees. Mal can hear the breaking of limbs as he moves. “Nikolai!” He might be imagining the slight hesitation, but Mal doesn’t have time to pass up on possible moments. He takes it, feeling desperate to keep him here. 

“I know you’re in there! Whatever’s happening to you, we can figure it out. Let me help!”

Another pause, just long enough for Mal to believe it’s working, before there is a large screeching cry and Nikolai takes off in flight. The disappointment crushes down on Mal, and he curses - loudly - turning to kick at his bedroll in frustration.

Three days and the best chance he’s had, ruined. Because he got too greedy. Because he acted too fast. He swallows back the possible panic and settles back to eat his dinner, trying to come up with any other plan. If he can’t convince Nikolai to come close enough for him to know what is actually happening, if he’s really _not_ in control of his mind in that form, what other choices does he have? Luring him back to Dva Stolba and potentially putting everyone in the town at risk? Finding a way to take him down without _killing him_? He’s a tracker, a hunter, not a trapper, and each of the wild, mythical beasts he’s tracked down so far have all met the same end.

Mal presses his face into his hands. Maybe this was a bad idea. Maybe this was more than just a bad idea. Maybe he’s entirely, wholly, completely out of his depth and he should have stayed at Alina’s side and made sure _she_ was safe. Then, at the very least, he could be useful. As a meat shield, if nothing else. 

_I am become a blade_.

He allows himself one moment, and then one moment more, of wallowing in that feeling before he takes a long breath and straightens back up again. Maybe he did make the wrong decision in following Nikolai, but he’s here now, so it doesn’t matter. He has three more days to find him and make it back to Alina and the others. And then they have a war to stop, a country to save. 

Kicking out the last of his fire, Mal settles into sleep, his head spinning with what could possibly become some formation of a new set of next steps. He doesn’t dream of much, he rarely does, but at some point during the night there is a distinct feeling he’s not alone. Like there are eyes on the back of his shoulders. 

The feeling is comforting, somehow. Almost familiar.

**SIKURZOI MOUNTAINS**

The next two days are frustrating. 

Despite the promising confidence Mal had left with after their last interaction, he gets no closer to Nikolai, and from what he can tell, it’s entirely Nikolai’s choice. Every time Mal thinks they may cross paths, Nikolai veers in a completely different direction. A familiar bubbling sense of annoyance comes and goes, and it’s not lost on Mal that even as a monster, even as he’s _tracking a monster of darkness_ , Nikolai manages to infuriate him. 

Each morning he wakes up thinking about it. How glad he is that no one else is here to see the great, talented tracker failing in bringing down a _fox_. He imagines Nikolai is taking some great enjoyment in it, too. Whatever part of him that was still active, still _in there_ , is surely enjoying the circles he making around Mal each day.

They stumble across each other a couple of times - just long enough to lock eyes, for there to be some hope that _maybe_ Mal can get close enough to him, and then for Nikolai to let out the same guttural, terrifying cry and flee.

Mal keeps away from the edge of the forest, though he knows Nikolai traverses across it and into towns. Mal knows Nikolai has been working so hard to avoid it, trying so hard to stay away, but he doesn’t hold off completely. Mal’s not ready to face that fact yet, or to think too hard about the smears of blood on Nikolai’s talons or across his mouth. He’d been so sure Nikolai was fighting his hunger, so sure Nikolai was _winning_ , but now? Now he’s not as certain.

He is an animal, just as all of those creatures are. He has to feed. But with each passing day, Mal struggles not to blame himself for the potential lives taken that he might have saved if he could _just get Nikolai to listen to him_. He doesn’t know exactly where this belief comes from, where he thought he might have that kind of power, but the guilt is solid and real and hot in him.

When he wakes up on the sixth day, something is different. He can feel it in his chest and down to his toes. The feeling sets him on edge, if only because he can’t pin it down, and with his hand on his rifle, he moves to stand up out of his bedroll.

There is nothing immediately different about the campsite itself. No brush that’s been moved, no stirring of the traps. The feeling is as strong as ever and Mal keeps looking, taking a few more steps forward, stilling his breath as much as he can to hear more of what’s around him. Something that is _here_ , present and dangerous and—

Mal forces himself to pause. To take a breath.

The feeling isn’t entirely new - it’s Nikolai. Nikolai is there, and most likely has been there for some time. Nikolai, who he now sees is crouched up in the trees right above where Mal had been sleeping. It’s a feat of balance and dexterity that Mal doesn’t whip around and lose his footing in the uneven ground. A feat of luck that as he meets the black eyes in the foliage, he doesn’t so much as blink.

In the shadow of the branches, he looks more monster than Mal remembers - talons sharp and wet with what he is very sure is his last kill, black eyes reflecting even in the early morning light. Mal can feel the hunger radiating from him, the need for blood, ravenous and violent and all-consuming.

What’s different about the feeling is that for once, it feels as though there is very little left of Nikolai in the beast that stares down at Mal. There’s a hint of intelligence, but not a solid presence of it. This is a hunter cornering its prey, and in response Mal is much more tense, prepared to reach for the gun and to fight, if necessary. The very real threat of the moment curls in Mal’s throat, but he swallows passed it, refusing to back down. 

He can do this. He can fix this. _You are in there_.

Above him hangs the very real truth that this is his last chance. If this is going to work, it has to work _now_. He doesn’t have a few more days to chase Nikolai across the Ravkan countryside. He doesn’t even have one.

Nikolai, as if sensing Mal’s reluctance to back down, steps off of the branch he’d been perching and lands on the abandoned bedding with a heavy thud. He stands to his full height, then, and lets his wings close behind him, leaving two large folds behind dark shoulders. It's undeniably blood on his talons and arms, some of it streaked across his cheek and mouth, and Mal’s stomach turns.

 _He is still in there, and he’s going to regret every moment of this until I get him out_.

Nikolai takes a step towards Mal, hunched over himself as he moves. Mal fights the urge to step back in turn, and instead lets Nikolai continue to advance on him. The fight or flight reaction boils under his skin, but he refuses to acknowledge it, grinding down on his teeth.

_He is in there. He is there._

Ten paces. Five. Then Nikolai steps close enough that if he wanted to rip out Mal’s throat, he could before Mal could let off a shot. Close enough that Mal can see his own reflection in the black of his eyes. Mal feels that fight or flight urge pick up in him, feels his skin begin to crawl with his own lack of action. He’s going to die, right here, if Nikolai decides as much. Nikolai pauses where he stands, baring his fangs with a low growl, and Mal waits for the attack.

That is when the feeling in his gut - the dangerous curl of a threat, the sense of being watched, being _hunted_ \- shift. Where, up until this very second, the threatening presence of an animal cornering its meal had been, is now replaced with the other. Replaced with the feeling of _Nikolai_ that had pulled Mal to the forest in the first place. More than that, Mal feels that Nikolai is _trying_ to scare Mal off. Not overtake him, not attack him, but scare him off. He wants Mal to run. He’s trying to drive him away. This is an intended moment, a planned decision, and the intelligence of that is what gives Mal the chance to breathe. To think.

Mal knows that in this present moment, he _could_ kill Nikolai. His rifle is in his grip. He just needs to lift and shoot. One shot, right in the maw, and it’d go straight to his brain. Quick, easy, simple. If the populous knew what had happened to their king, their golden boy, they would never allow him to return to court. Would never stand for him ruling over Ravka. The future of the country would be left to the same chaos it’s in now, without a single person to take his place.

Alina is desperate to save Nikolai. Just as she’s trying to save everyone. But she can’t do it on her own, no matter how much she tries. Mal desperately wants to take that weight off of her, to find something that he could help accomplish, where she didn’t have to. 

More than that, _Mal_ is desperate to save him. To find, somewhere in those dark intelligent eyes, the same glint, the same grin, the same haughty confidence that Mal has hated for _so long_. He wants - no, _needs_ \- to see it again. To catch hazel eyes from across a room.

Nikolai’s black eyes narrow as he glares, snarls threateningly, and Mal doesn’t so much as flinch.

That decides it.

Where the idea comes from, he’s not sure, but Mal doesn’t give himself a chance to second-guess it as he holds out his hand, feeling absolutely, entirely ridiculous. How else is he supposed to feel in the middle of a small clearing, sun hanging high in the sky, with a winged, disfigured creature in front of him? Who is supposed to, in some way, be the same prince-now-king that Mal has honestly _hated_ for more than he hasn’t during the time they’ve known each other?

It _is_ ridiculous. All of this is ridiculous. But then comes a single second of clarity that focuses not only on this moment, but every moment surrounding it.

It wasn’t that long ago that the worst thing he had to imagine was how to tell Alina he’d been with Zoya that night. It wasn’t that long ago that they were simply soldiers of the First Army, feet on the ground, headed towards the capital. 

Since then, they have had their lives threatened on multiple occasions, Alina has learned to summon the sun, the Darkling has betrayed Ravka and attempted to kill the entire royal family _and_ attempted to seduce Alina and use her power to take over Rakva, they’ve met more Grisha than Mal can ever try and remember and some he wouldn’t be able to forget.

And then there was Nikolai Lantsov. First the Privateer, then the bastard son returned. Charismatic, witty, creative, intelligent, crafty, powerful, handsome, incredible Nikolai – who may or may not actually have a claim to the throne.

Nikolai – who is the last hope for Ravka, the shining sun, the prince perfect, the _king_ – who the Darkling had specifically targeted because of all of this. Who he had infected specifically to tear Ravka down from its very base.

Nikolai – who had been mutated into some kind of strange, half-monster, half not. A creature who watched Mal with a complicated look. The threat was still there, somewhere in the darkness of his eyes, but in addition there was something more. Something that reminded Mal distinctly of the bright, knowing look Mal was so used to catching. Who had watched him before, and who watches him now, curious and intelligent and _there_.

Mal can see him, through the dark lines that seeped into his veins. Through the talons, and the claws, and the wings, and the fangs. Through the void of black eyes and blood smears. The echoes of that shriek.

The king of Ravka stood before him – different, maybe. Changed. But still _him_ , and saints, Mal wants to help him. Help him any way he can. He’d do _anything_ , and it settles in him suddenly how true that statement is.

 _Let me help._ _Please._

The feeling overtakes him, overwhelming, how he has to do something. How this has to work. There is no Ravka without its king and Nikolai _is_ that king. He always has been. In a singular moment, it feels like the entire previous year has been brought into perspective, and Mal realizes he’s always known that. Known that he would do anything for Nikolai, no matter whatever jealousy had clouded their initial meeting. No matter how infuriating his smile could be, or the things he said. 

He would, and will, do anything for him. 

_Let me bring you back._

Mal is very aware and has accepted the fact that the risk he is taking (because it is a risk, it has always been a risk) could very well end his life. He could die here, if Nikolai decides it to be so. 

He is at the mercy of the part-king, part-monster. Wholly and completely.

But Mal stands true to his decision. He holds out his hand and waits – palm flat and unassuming. He watches Nikolai watch him back, and then has the thought to turn away. He is already defenseless, what is one more step? He takes a breath, says a small prayer to whichever saint might be listening, and closes his eyes.

 _You know me. Nikolai- you’re in there, and you recognize me. I know you do. I can tell_. _I know. I need you to know it too._

Mal is met with silence for the couple of moments that follow. Silence, and every other sound that always plays out in the forest around him. Animals, going about their day. Insects, buzzing through the air. He is simultaneously aware of himself and the squirrels and rabbits and other vermin shuffling around the underbrush. He is aware of the birds, and the trees, and the forest itself, breathing all around him. And amongst it all, somehow, he is aware of Nikolai – watching him still, yes, but stepping towards him. Closer and closer.

It doesn’t come as a surprise, because of that awareness, when Nikolai presses his forehead to Mal’s palm. Part of Mal wonders if he imagines it - the rush of power traveling from him through his palm. If he imagines Nikolai, tense at first, suddenly relaxing under the press of Mal’s hand. If he imagines the way Nikolai lets out a soft breath, almost like a sigh, against Mal’s wrist.

He tenses – not out of shock but instead out of uncertainty of what to do next – before he lets his hand relax against Nikolai’s forehead and open his eyes.

What he sees is just about what he expects. Nikolai, marred by darkness. Nikolai, with black scars across his chest and arms, talons and wings broken through skin and muscle. Dark streaks of night stretch across him, following veins and muscles and skin. But what Mal notices, more than all of that, is how soft Nikolai’s hair still feels against his fingertips.

He runs his thumb gently across Nikolai’s forehead and feels another exhale. It’s a soft moment, something that hits squarely in Mal’s chest. Something needy, wanting, and almost there. Now, more than anything, the seriousness of the war weighs on him. On the man, now a monster, pressing his forehead more firmly into Mal’s hand. Docile. Relieved. Exhausted. 

It’s a relief that this had worked. That Nikolai hadn’t just turned and bitten Mal’s hand clean off. But he hasn’t, which is all the confirmation Mal needs to know he’s been right. That his _feeling_ had been right. But even in the confirmation of his feeling, there is something else gnawing at him. A new thought he hadn’t realized he’s been wondering.

“You can understand me, can’t you?”

Nikolai stills, but doesn’t pull away. Mal takes that as an agreement.

“The Darkling has the other Grisha.” He’s talking too quickly, letting the words flow out of him in a rush, but he’s not sure how much time he’ll have. “He’s not going to stop, and the Unsea is growing. The firebird-” Mal cuts himself off, the anxiety surrounding the entire ordeal heavy and complicated in his chest. 

Nikolai pulls away from Mal then, but not far, turning his black eyes back to the tracker. Mal meets the look, but the longer he holds it, the more he feels himself read through. He refuses to bend under those dark eyes, but knowing Nikolai, his secrets are being pulled out from him.

Mal, without knowing the question, sighs. “I should be with them, hunting it down. We are supposed to be looking for the firebird to get Alina the last amplifier. I should _be there_ , but I came looking for you instead.” 

Because at the heart of it all, that’s the truth of it. A guilty weight that continues to grow and grow behind Mal’s ribs. He’s questioning himself even now that he has the chance to _convince_ Nikolai to come with him. Questioning if this has been the best use of his time all along. He’d been so sure, at the start. When he’d woken up that morning he _knew_ finding Nikolai was the only way. But what if he’s just been wasting time? Nikolai might be in there, somewhere behind the shadow streaked across his skin, but would he _help_?

What if something has happened to them while Mal has been here? Not just Alina, but the others too? It’s a strange sort of feeling to realize just how much he’s started to care for them all. People he’d not that long ago been so _jealous_ over, who he now would give his life for if needed. What if they’re hurt? Or lost? What if during these last few days the Darkling has found them?

_You are supposed to protect them, and you left them, for what?_

Nikolai sits up and leans closer to Mal quite suddenly, shaking him from the thought. Mal startles and Nikolai resettles back on his haunches, looking almost content to have Mal’s attention back on him again. 

The movement is just so _Nikolai_ that Mal just sort of sits there and blinks at him. Despite himself, Mal can hear his voice behind the look. _Get it together, Oretzev. You might be the dark and broody one, but there’s a war to win_.

And he’s right. The truth of what they’re facing is hard to ignore. The Darkling, fate of their country, _Alina_. Mal nods, answering the question that hasn’t been asked. 

There is a war. Alina will have to face the Darkling. And she’s going to need all the help they can give her.

“We’re going to end this for good. _All_ of us.” He pauses, waiting for some kind of reaction, but Nikolai simply tilts his head questioningly. Once again, Mal hears the tilt of Nikolai’s voice in the back of his head.

_You think I’m going to make this easy for you? Come now, you know as well as I do that you’re going to have to say it._

Mal sighs, his eyes rolling. He’s being sassed in silence by the king of Ravka and he’s not even surprised. 

“We need _you_ , Nikolai. You know our numbers, and they’ve only gotten smaller. But it’s our chance, and we _can_ do this. For this to work, they need you. Alina needs you.” 

Nikolai watches him, black eyes unblinking. He can still hear it, like he can see through the dark in Nikolai’s eyes to his thoughts. His reaction. 

_You and I both know I can’t help like this._

“Yes you _can_.” If it’s more desperate than Mal would have liked to sound, only Nikolai is around to hear it. “You’re more than this thing. You have more control over it than you think.” Nikolai’s expression shifts, then, a frown pulling at his jaw. Mal keeps going, feeling unraveled. “I’ve known you’ve been in there this entire time, and you know it too.” It’s Mal’s turn to close the distance, stepping towards Nikolai and pressing his palm to Nikolai’s chest. “You may be different, but you’re still you. You would have killed me the second we saw each other if that wasn’t true.”

Nikolai blinks, seemingly confused at what Mal is saying.

“You can’t argue this. I see it. I see _you_ .” Nikolai steps away from him again, out of Mal’s reach, and shakes his head. But Mal feels a surge of stubbornness in him and closes the distance again, not letting Nikolai get far from him. “We have a plan, and we are going to _stop_ the Darkling. Your _country_ needs you, you stubborn, insufferable jerk.” He presses a finger into Nikolai’s chest pointedly. “ _I_ need you.”

The last three words hang in the air between them, and it’s only after they’ve settled that Mal realizes how much he means them. More than he’s really let himself acknowledge. He needs the easy confidence, the grin, the sly commentary, and the way the room changes just seeing him walk inside. And now that he’s noticed it, it’s a solid, heavy notch in his chest.

He misses him. Despite everything, he _misses_ Nikolai Lantsov _desperately_.

The monster stares back at him, dark eyes unblinking, and the confidence Mal had been depending on waivers.

A noise off in the trees grabs Nikolai’s attention, and Mal panics. _No, don’t leave. This has to work. There’s no other choice._ Nikolai steps back away from Mal again, his attention fully on the trees, and without needing much confirmation, he knows Nikolai is going to leave. 

“Wait—” And Nikolai does hesitate, turning back to meet Mal’s eyes once more. Mal holds them, as if to reaffirm everything he’s been saying. “We’re going to be in Dva Stolba. Find us there.”

It could be his imagination. The fact he wants to see acknowledgment in Nikolai could mean that he’s just seeing the response he wants to see. But he swears to the saints that Nikolai nods - just once - before his wings stretch out and he takes to the skies.

Mal watches him leave, eyes upward, as the figure of Nikolai disappears into the clouds.

In the following moments, he recognizes that he could have, very easily, just missed his chance. Alina had told him to come back with Nikolai, to bring him with him, and Mal realizes he’s failed on that front. But along with that, this could easily be the last time he ever sees the High King of Ravka ever again.

Alone with only the trees and a few errant fauna, Mal prays. It is not significant, nor is it impressive. Mal had never really been taught how to pray properly to the saints, seeing as religion was not considered important enough to be taught to the children, and while there had been moments where he’d been able to observe the act, he had little experience to draw on.

He can feel a mother deer and her child stumbling over a decaying trunk of a tree towards his left. A few crows up in the trees to his right. He can sense the breath of the forest and its intent, its existence.

He closes his eyes and whispers, once, _please_.

And then he turns, picking up the remains of his camp, and heads back to return to Alina. To the other Grisha. To end the war.

**THE UNSEA, RAVKA**

He makes it back. They find the firebird, but it wasn’t the firebird they were looking for. It was Mal.

They’d all fought him on it, when the secret got out. Whereas Mal felt better than he had in years, every other member of their party felt heavier. Alina seemed almost to ignore it was fact at all, like what they’d felt when he was hanging off the edge of that cliff had never happened. Alina outright refuses to talk about it, refuses to even look at him for too long when the topic is in the air. Mal wishes it could be easier, but no part of this has been easy from the start.

He is the third amplifier. With his death, she’ll have enough power to stop the Darkling and end this war.

There’s a peace that comes with it. Knowing that there is something else to all of this. Some part he actually gets to play in the wars against saints.

The other Grisha grieve, in their own way. And he can’t really blame them. If he’d been in their shoes, he’d be just as upset, just as denying. And he will miss them, he knows that much. Harshaw’s ranting, Zoya’s quick, sharp commentary. Tamar’s grins and quick hands. Nadia’s clear voice. Genya’s smile. David’s mind. Even Tolya’s poetry.

And Alina...saints. He feels bad, knowing what it will do to her. Feels guilty in a way that no words can really describe. But in the end, it’s _better_. For once, he actually feels like he can help her. Actually feels like he’ll be of _use_. 

The plan is in motion. A small group of them took two skiffs out across the sand with Alina refracting the light and keeping them both invisible, safe in the air. 

Until it all took a turn. It always did. That was war, and each of the people who joined her in the mission knew how it could end.

Something happens - he’s not sure what, as Alina is on the other skiff with Tolya and Tamar, and is too far for him to see - but it’s not good. Soldiers around him flicker into view, and off in the distance he sees it - Tamar, appearing on the prow, just long enough for a nichevo’ya to see her, to screech, to dive.

 _No._ _No!_

Mal jerks into motion, ready to jump down and off and leave himself open. He sees a nichevo’ya sinking its talons into Tamar’s back and he has to _move_. It’s as he’s stepping over the edge when he sees it - a shape in the sky, a shape he _knows_. He feels it the second it dives down towards Tamar, gripping the other creature, wrenching it free from her and tossing it back into the darkness.

Mal’s breath catches in his chest - _Nikolai_ , wings spread, hovering for a mere half-second before diving back into the fray. Nikolai, in control, here, _helping them_.

 _Nikolai is here_. _He came._

Mal smiles, and despite all that he knows about this war and all that they’re getting into, feels a surge of something that could almost be hope course through him.

 _This could work_.

That is when their shield and light drops, the fires from the two skiffs harsh and limited in their light, and Mal’s attention is violently brought back. _Alina_.

She’s found the Darkling. She’s hurt.

Without thinking, Mal crests over the side of the skiff and jumps down into the sand, joining the chaos of battle. In the darkness, it was difficult to actually see what was happening, who was who and where, but with the illuminated skiffs there is just enough light for him to know where to go. To act. 

He lets off a shot and one of the Darkling’s soldiers drops. He hears Harshaw yell out in pain, and whirls around to let off another. As he does so, he notices Nikolai diving into battle once again. For just a moment, Mal watches him, the dark wings and black talons spearing through the air. He looks different than before - there’s a confidence to him, a control. More than that - he’s _in_ control, making decisions, acting on them, and holding control even with the bloodshed surrounding him.

Mal can almost hear Nikolai’s voice in it all, see grin. _You think I’d miss out on a fight? When I can_ **fly**?

A frustrated cry breaks through the fighting, a distinct howl of rage. _The Darkling._ Mal whips back around towards the sound, just in time to face a volcra as it lunges for him, talons digging into his shoulders and shoving him onto his back. He feels the wind leave him, the sharp pain where the talons break through his skin. He lets off a shot, the last in his gun, but the volcra simply screeches back at him, its mouth open, sharp teeth bared. Mal doesn’t take even a breath before he takes the opportunity to jam the barrel up into its jaw. 

Fear and adrenaline shoots through him, coupled with an overwhelming hunger for blood. It’s the volcra above him, he realizes, and he pushes back against the force of it. He’s feeling the volcra in the same way he feels the creatures in the forest, the same way he had felt Nikolai. It disgusts him. He has to get _free_ of this and get to Alina, and he’s running out of time.

_This isn’t working._

There are more screams, more sounds of their friends falling. 

He shoves upwards, trying to throw the volcra off of him, but the talons are hooked into the muscle of his shoulders. He can feel them digging deeper into the tissue, and a frustrated noise breaks free of him. 

The creature on top of him snarls, and Mal tries again to throw it free, but in doing so feels his hand start to slip down the handle and panic surges through him. If he doesn’t keep his hold-

_I have to get to Alina. I have to—_

With very little warning, the volcra is pulled away from him. Mal’s eyes widened, unsure if it’s rearing back to attack or something else. Part of him thinks _this is it_ but then it screams in pain, not aggression, and its talons release from his shoulders. Mal doesn’t wait, grabbing for Tamar’s knife at his hip and driving it into the chest of the monster. He drags the knife through its ribcage and upwards, from stomach to neck. It _wails_ , the sound of a creature on its last breath, before it shutters and collapses to the sand to Mal’s side.

Mal breathes heavily, staring at the carcass and letting the moment settle. When he looks up, Nikolai is standing over him, wings stretched out, talons, arms, and face smeared with something dark and liquid. Blood, most likely, and the thought sinks in Mal’s stomach as he scrambles to his feet.

“Nikolai.”

The creature shifts, black eyes looking from the volcra body, then to the skiff, before turning his attention to Mal. The sounds of battle dull as the two watch each other. There’s an urge to step towards him, to reach out and close the distance, but before he can there’s another sound, another scream, and Mal glances over back towards the Darkling’s ship.

 _Alina_.

When he looks back, Nikolai nods to him - just barely - and takes off into the sky himself, back to the fight. Mal hears gunshots, someone yells Nadia and Zoya’s name, and Mal turns back to the darkness. He doesn’t question it, doesn’t need to, because he knows exactly where Alina is. _Exactly_. 

He takes off into the dark cloud of sand and the Fold. Moves - pained by the wounds in his shoulder and the ache in his chest. But he keeps walking, keeps moving, until he finds her.

“Alina.”

She spins in the dark, and Mal sees all of it at once. The lame arm, the blood. She’s been shot, but it is more than that. She’s running, terrified, at a loss.

She’s out of options. All except for one.

He reaches for her wounded arm, grabs it and sees her wince. How had he gotten here? How had he known where she’d been? It was his gift, he knew that. He _knows_ that. The same gift that Alina needs. Flashes of their friends and the other Grisha cross his mind, the screams they made, the blood and chaos around them.

She summons a weak ray of light and as it washes over her, he’s struck by how beautiful she is. Even streaked in blood, eyes wild and desperate. He loves her so much it almost brings him to his knees.

_There’s no other choice._

He has the knife in his hand and her eyes go to it, understanding taking the place of fear.

“Mal, don’t. This isn’t over yet—” 

“It is, Alina.”

Alina tries to jerk away from him, but Mal shifts his grip to hold her wrist, fingers pinching together. She jerks, and he knows she’s feeling the power. It’s the same as when she’d seen the stag, when the fetter had been attached to her other wrist. He pushes Tamar’s blade into her fingers, forcing her grip around it, but she keeps fighting him.

“No!” She sobs, the fear returning. Mal grits his teeth through the sound, fighting the urge to do whatever he can to make that sound go away.

“Don’t let it all be for nothing, Alina.”

“Please—”

It hurts. The way she looks at him and he can see it, even with the flickering light. The way she trembles under his hands. She doesn’t want this, more than anything she doesn’t want this, because there’s some part of her that thinks that maybe there could be another way. But Mal knows better. Knows that even with the price he will have to pay - that they both will pay - this is the only option. And honestly? He has found peace in that. For once in his life, he _can_ save all of them, _can_ save Alina, and put a stop to the Darkling, the war.

He can save Nikolai, too.

Zoya’s scream rises above the sounds of battle, pained and agonized, and he watches Alina’s attention flicker, panic clear in her eyes. Mal notices the crick in her armor, and takes advantage of it. 

She can hate him when he’s dead.

“Save them, Alina. Don’t let me live knowing I might have stopped this.”

When her eyes come back to him, her expression breaks, and no matter how stubborn she can be, she knows he’s right. It settles his resolve even further. 

“Mal—”

“Save them. This once, let me carry you.” He squeezes her wrist, locking his eyes with her. All the fear and anger and hopelessness he meets with affirmation. Confidence in his decision, enough to take the place of her uncertainty. “End this.”

 _There is no end to our story_.

There’s no way to tell if she is the push behind the knife, or if he is guiding her hands, pressing the blade up into his chest, through his ribcage, and to his heart. But the knife sinks through, a warmth spreading through him. 

Surprise is the first thing he registers, surprise at the lack of pain and how different it feels than what he expected. Secondly, as if from a distance, he hears the sound of the knife falling with a dull thud into the sand. He wonders if it even worked, if it had been deep enough to kill him, before he feels the world teeter under his feet and his grip on Alina’s wrist tightens, as if he can use her to steady himself.

“Mal.” She sobs, and Mal knows how it must look. He opens his mouth to reassure her, to tell her that it’s fine, it will be fine, but in the place of the words is a cough, and then a wet thickness filling his throat. _I’m drowning_ he thinks, and panics, before another thought takes its place. _Oh, I’m dying._

He looks at Alina, one last time, before everything slides out from under him. He tries to focus on the grip around her wrist, the warmth of her body near him, until it steadily fades away. 

Into darkness, he thinks, once and for all.

He doesn’t remember waking up, doesn’t remember the weak, pained breath he takes when it happens. But for whatever reason, he does remember the image of a winged figure, rising into the sky, remembers watching as the wings disappear in a flash of light. A single flash of light, and then the figure falls. And falls. And falls.

**KERAMZIN, WEST RAVKA**

Life goes on. 

The orphanage at Keramzin gets set up. The boy and girl return to a life they, at one point, truly knew. Though this time it’s a little different, this time everything is a little different.

The shock of white hair. The nights where they can’t sleep. Days of wandering around the halls, quiet and a bit lost, waiting to find their footing again.

He helps teach the children to track, teaches them to hunt, though it’s not quite right. Everything feels different, now. The feel of the earth, the weight of the wind. He watches Alina teach them to draw, to tell stories. The boy and girl are happy, he thinks. As happy as they can be. As happy as, perhaps, they ought to be.

Three years ago, this had been all that Mal had wanted. All that he and Alina had talked about. A quiet life, together, back in the house that had raised them both. This had been _everything_ driving him forward, everything he wanted at the end of the tunnel.

And now that he has it, it’s not.

It takes some time for that to settle in, not just for Mal, but for Alina too. And it doesn’t become apparent until he’s healed, until his strength returns and their life finds a normal and children begin to fill the halls again. It starts as a nagging, a feeling that something is different.

At first, he thinks it’s the sudden lack of his abilities. Thinks that it’s just the dull ache of a missing limb. And it’s true, it _does_ ache. He does not hear the sounds of the trees around him. Does not know where, if anywhere, a rabbit may be hiding. It’s a kind of silence where he only notices the sound existed now that they are gone, a low humming he’d always had, now doesn’t.

Alina likens his ache to her losing her power. _It was a part of me, even if it was fairly new. Even if I just learned to understand it. And now it’s gone._

And then she smiles, soft and a little sad, and he slides his hand around hers. It’s a comfort, even if he doesn’t understand it. To know - at least in this - he’s not alone in his brokenness.

But once he has some time to think about it, he’s not as sure. 

Because there is the hollowness, like a part of him is gone, but there is more. More to the way that he and Alina look at each other. More to the quiet nights they spend in the parlor. Alina is more quiet than before, yes, but Mal thinks it’s a shared feeling.

A kind of longing, a kind of ache. It takes a few months into that first year together that she breaks down and tells him - how much she misses Zoya, how much she just wants to see her again.

Mal nods, understanding, and rubs circles into her back.

**KERAMZIN, WEST RAVKA**

Presents at Keramzin become, much to Mal’s dismay, an anticipated and fairly normal occurrence. Ravka has its fair share of holidays, but not all of them require gifts. Most involved festivals and parades and fancy fruit, treats, and sweets. But after the third, and then the fourth, carriage of packages arrived at their door, Mal decided to stop trying to hide it.

 _They’ll get spoiled_ He’d told Alina, sighing as they unloaded the most recent back of small presents. They sound like bells, maybe whistles, and there is a pun in there Mal refuses to acknowledge. Alina just smiled, her eyes falling to the Lantsov crest on the attached note.

 _Then you can take it up with the King_.

Mal almost does when the first full-sized sled arrives at their door. The last few shipments had been useless, impractical gifts - twenty small sets of ice skates, dolls of every saint, large, extravagant balloons and printed paper for crafts - but when the first _full_ carriage arrives, Mal has to put his foot down.

Except that when the door opens, it is not gifts that come spilling out, but Genya, David, and finally Zoya. He watches the way Alina brightens, the way she fully shifts her mood upon seeing the dark haired Grisha, that Mal decides - maybe - it isn’t worth putting up a fight.

And so, they keep coming. Usually for the larger festivals, under the guise of a hidden carriage, a special mission. Usually, it’s Zoya and Genya and David making the trek to bring gifts and food and anything else that Mal and Alina let them leave behind. They tell stories of the new normal at the capital, of Nikolai - the gleaming Boy King - and how slowly, but surely, things are coming back together again. 

Nikolai does not come that first year and Mal ignores how much it bothers him. He hadn't had the chance to say goodbye after the battle, too weak and barely breathing as he was. He’d told himself there was no point, what did a dead tracker have to do with a King, anyway? But after that first trip, when Genya and David and Zoya had climbed back into the carriage bound for Os Alta, Mal can’t help but notice something clawing under his ribs.

A useless thing, that feeling. One he pushes away, turning instead back to the manor, and life returns to normal.

The feeling does not fade, no matter how much Mal works to ignore it. Of wishing Nikolai had come to visit. Of wondering why he didn’t. Of regretting not having a chance to say goodbye or thanks or to make sure that he really was all back to normal. Regret tastes bitter in the back of his throat, made worse by the continued shipments of presents, the sudden collection of boxes and bags branded with the double eagle. Mal wants to burn them all, but Alina simply shakes her head and laughs.

The worst of it, he thinks, is the painting. The obnoxiously large portrait of their newest king. Alina laughs so hard she starts choking when they finally get it unwrapped, and Mal is already reaching for his blade. 

_We are not hanging that here_.

Another snort. _No, but you don’t have to destroy it_.

The painting gets put back in a storeroom, as Mal finds he can’t bring himself to throw it out, and Alina never mentions it again.

But then the second festival - the Feast of Saint Nikolai - he does come. All impressive cloaks and bags of gifts and glittering, shameless grins. Alina is thrilled, Mal can feel her smile radiating off of her, as she bounces off down the stairs to the carriage in their drive.

Mal, on the other hand, feels a bit like he can’t quite breathe. A bit like he’s falling.

Genya’s voice brings him out of it, and he descends the stairs quickly to catch up. Genya gives Alina a quick hug first, and then Mal, leaving room for Zoya and Alina to embrace. Mal shakes David’s hand next, then nods at Zoya who smiles and nods back - as warm a welcome he’s used to getting from her, when she won’t take her arm away from around Alina’s waist.

When Nikolai steps out from the cart, Mal catches his eye - a single glimpse, a single moment - where Mal simply bows his head. It’s the most respectful thing he can think to do before their now-crowned king of Ravka, but something in his gut tells him it’s the wrong move. When he looks up again, Nikolai’s attention has turned to Alina - with lavish compliments, absurd remarks, and a hug as soon as Alina untangles herself.

Mal moves to reach for the large sack of what he assumes are gifts in the back of the carriage, and is surprised when he’s joined by Nikolai. They meet eyes once more, and Mal swears he sees just a bit of Nikolai’s grin fade. Just a bit of the mask slip away. But then Mal blinks and Nikolai is back to normal. Giving orders, pushing off responsibilities, complaining at the prospect that _the king of Ravka, made to be a bag boy_.

They head inside in a flurry of movement, conversations light and fond, decorations spread through the halls. The children all come in a rush and somewhere along the way Mal, truly, finds himself grinning at how easy it all feels. How _good_. 

The feast is had and kvos is drunk and Mal, as the evening continues on, keeps glancing back across the table to Nikolai. In turn, he keeps finding those hazel eyes back on him. Searching, thoughtful, curious, but also… what? Playful? Who is he kidding?

Mal is struck those first couple of moments of eye contact by how much he had been _waiting_ for those eyes. To see hazel, where the last he’d seen was black. To see the bright spark of thought, of Nikolai’s tone, reflected back to him. It catches him a bit off-guard, when he does realize it, and it flutters a bit uncomfortable between his ribs. Because of that feeling, Mal tries to avoidmeeting those eyes when he can - the fluttering in his chest makes him feel a little weak and he doesn’t want to unpack that fact at the present moment - and goes back to dinner. He comments on Zoya’s new title, on the work and life she and Genya now lead, poking fun at their responsibilities and how Zoya (of all people) finds herself the mother hen of so many. Zoya retorts back - asking if _he’s_ really one to talk about being a mother hen - and the table shares a chuckle. It’s all in good fun, all of it is fun, it’s _good_ and _happy_ and he hasn’t seen Alina look this bright in ages from where she sits to Zoya’s side.

Nikolai laughs along with them, offers his own comments and explanations into the conversation, but Mal reminds himself _not to look_ and turns his attention to the others. Rolls his eyes at something they say, tells the children not to repeat that phrase. Finishes his kvos.

They put the children to bed after dinner and move into the lounge, a fire bright and warm in the hearth. Genya and David settle in close to each other on one of the couches, still quite happy it appears, and Zoya and Alina are sitting opposite them. Mal wonders where Nikolai will settle, if at all, and then stops himself before the connected thought can follow.

Nikolai must sense it, because when Mal turns, it’s the king standing in front of him. _Too close_.

“Care to give me a tour?”

Mal, as prepared as ever, makes an effort to not step back. “Um.”

“I can order you if it’d make this easier.” Nikolai grins, and there’s the barest hint of Sturmhond in it. Just enough for Mal to notice, and then have enough awareness to pull himself out of the thought.

Instead, he rolls his eyes at that, turning back to the doorway and heading back to the rest of the manor. It’s not the first time Mal has given this kind of tour of the orphanage, he actually quite likes them, so it’s easy enough to fall into the rhythm. The history, the use of the rooms, why there is a particular painting across that wall.

They don’t make it very far before Mal steps inside one of the side storage rooms on the ground floor and Nikolai pulls the door closed behind them, the click a resounding echo in the dark space. Nikolai’s voice is a clear cut through the space.

“We need to talk.”

“Do we?” Mal doesn’t appreciate feeling trapped. He doesn’t like feeling as though this conversation is going to go in the exact direction he doesn’t want it to go. There are things he hasn’t said, things they haven’t talked about, and he’s a right fool to think they’d never come up again. 

But maybe it’s not entirely irrational to believe _the king of Ravka_ wouldn’t take the time to come visit him specifically to ask about things he may not even remember. They couldn’t be worth his time, right?

He should know better than to underestimate Nikolai Lantsov.

Nikolai snorts, running a gloved hand through his tasseled hair. This close, Mal recalls that the carriage definitely had a roof, so there would be no reason for Nikolai’s hair to be this mused except by his own hand. He’d been playing with his hair at dinner, running fingers back through it every now and then, and his cheeks are flush (how much kvos did Nikolai even drink?) and saints, why is Mal even _noticing_ these things?

Nikolai smiles, but it’s tired. “As it turns out, we do.”

There’s a tilt to Nikolai’s voice that makes Mal want to answer him. Want to follow his wishes and spill his guts and leave it all out on the table. But Mal knows that is just _Nikolai_. Part of his charm, yes, but part of his skill as well. He knows how to get people to say exactly what he needs them to say exactly when he needs them to say it, and Mal refuses to simply be another _person_.

“And if I have no idea what you’re talking about, your _highness_?”

His words come out stilted. Tense and awkward and avoidant. Mal winces a bit as he says the title, out of his own embarrassment at how forced it sounds but also at the look Nikolai shoots him.

“Oretsev—“

“That’s not my name.” These words are quick, hard, and uncompromising. Nikolai pauses for half of a moment before he lets out a breath through his nose as his eyes turn up to the ceiling as he starts to move into the room. Exasperated.

“Fine, _Dmitri_.” He glances over to Mal – eyes alight with some kind of amalgamation of authority and desperation and something so entirely foreign to Mal he’s not quite sure what to call it. 

Mal meets the look but doesn’t push back against it again. After a moment, his brows lift in a silent _well?_

Nikolai pauses, then. Straightens his coat sleeves. Coughs, once, and then fiddles with the edge of his gloves. Those damn gloves. He hasn’t taken them off since arriving, despite how much warmer it is inside the manor. Mal’s eyes focus on them as if to ignore the awkward pause in the room.

“I’ve told my counsel—“ He means Zoya. Zoya and Genya and Tolya and Tamar and David. His counsel, the new leaders of Ravka. Despite the memories, despite the knowledge that he _knows them_ and that they are more than just members of a council, that they are _friends_ , the comparison to a counsel to the king and the people in just the other room makes Mal feel a bit small. “-and Alina how I don’t remember much of my time as the monster.”

Mal knows this. Alina had spoken to Nikolai after the battle, when Mal hadn’t been allowed to leave the room, when she still had Misha looking after him, when he had been too weak to do much more than eat and sleep. There was a solid period of time that Mal doesn’t remember much of anything, and a period of time he does, but Alina had _told_ him about her talk with Nikolai. So when Nikolai brings it up, it doesn’t come as a surprise. And yet, even so, Mal almost feels…well. Jealous. There’s no point in hiding it. Jealousy. Over what Mal _hadn’t_ gotten to do. Who he hadn’t been able to talk to.

“A terrible thing.” Mal tries to sound bored, uninterested, like his heart isn’t starting to beat a bit faster.

Nikolai twitches as he turns to start pacing in front of Mal, five steps to one side, then five to the next. Mal isn’t sure he’s seen this kind of nervous energy from Nikolai before.

“I’ve told Alina-“ That’s not her name, either, Mal thinks. And he should correct Nikolai. But something about it feels out of place. “That I do remember not being able to read, as well. That I could recognize the letters on a sign as letters, but that I couldn’t put them together. I couldn’t _understand_ them.”

Mal knows this too, as Alina had told him as much. But even so, Nikolai looks at him, and Mal isn’t sure if it’s to gauge a reaction or to make sure he’s listening. When Mal doesn’t respond, Nikolai sighs.

“But that’s not the _entire_ truth.”

The pause that follows is weighted. Nikolai comes to a stop, turning back to face Mal fully for the first time since they’ve entered the room. For the first time, truly, this entire night. His shoulders are square, proud, as if he’s facing down the barrel of a gun. Mal swallows.

“I remember _you_ , Oretsev. Finding me in the forest, talking to me.”

Mal hears his heartbeat in his ears. He finds it’s hard to swallow. _Pull yourself together_.

“It’s Dimitri.”

Nikolai watches him, holding his eyes, before some part of him deflates.

“ _Saints_ , Mal, I’m trying to thank you for what you did. Can you spare me a single moment to use your name? Just a single moment?”

It comes out as a joke – Mal can hear it in the air. The lightened tilt, the ease of tension. Nikolai is smiling at him but it’s a different smile than Mal has seen him use before. Softer, somehow. It doesn’t escape him how he’d used his name, _Mal_ , and how different it sounds on his lips. The weird things it does to his chest. 

Mal lets the silence last for too long. He realizes it too late, too, and watches as that smile fades into something he could _almost_ call self-consciousness. Almost. Except that it is Nikolai Lantsov standing in front of him, and he’d never wear self-consciousness that casually.

He feels uncomfortable. Like there is some kind of spotlight on him, despite how very alone the two of them are.

When Mal finally pulls himself together enough to answer, he wishes his voice sounded a little less honest. “There’s nothing to thank me for.”

“Are you forgoing my gratitude? The gratitude of a king?”

Mal feels something akin to defensiveness rise up in him. He doesn’t like the way Nikolai says that - _of a king_ \- but in not liking it, Mal has to remind himself he’s the one who brought titles into this conversation in the first place. Nikolai Lantsov will always _be_ a king, whether or not he states it aloud. Mal feels his jaw tighten a bit, and he definitely doesn’t like that look in Nikolai’s eyes. The same look he’s given Alina, Zoya, the Darkling. Like he’s trying to pick Mal apart from his very core.

It scares him, in a way. Because if Nikolai was able to see through Alina, to see through the other Grisha, the _Darkling_ most of all, Mal must appear more like glass. And Mal isn’t sure he wants Nikolai to see what he’s keeping in there.

So what does he do, to protect himself in that situation? He lashes out.

“It was not a king who I tracked down in that forest.”

 _I am not a king yet_.

It seems to have done the trick, as Nikolai’s look and smile go still. Mal feels guilty, really, but the entire situation and conversation has thrown him off, and he wants to move past it. To act like it never happened.

“No, it wasn’t.” Nikolai’s voice commands attention again, and as Mal jerks his eyes back over to him, not realizing they’d drifted away, and he sees Nikolai watching him. Direct and uncompromising. “It was a monster that could have- _should_ have- killed you.” 

Mal remembers the adrenaline and terror coursing through him. The smell of blood that came from Nikolai. The way his head had tilted, just slightly, as if surveying its prey. But even now Mal recognizes that it was still Nikolai, in those moments. Monster or no. And it wouldn’t have been the first time he’d worn a different face.

“But you left the people you trusted and who you have sworn to protect to find it.”

Mal doesn’t realize Nikolai is closing the distance between them until it is too late, his steps a slow, elegant movement that has Mal backing towards the wall and nearly tripping on the edge of a box before he even understands what is happening.

“A monster _you_ should have killed at first sight, but you didn’t. Nor did you kill it the second time, or third. Why is that, Mal? Why is it-“ Another step closer. “You let a creature of darkness and destruction-” Another step. “Survive?”

Mal swallows, unsure of how to answer. There is a string of words that he can feel slowly start to form in his chest, but Nikolai is too close and his eyes are too bright for him to even think to say them aloud.

Silence follows for a few breaths with the two of them standing less than a foot apart from each other. Mal notices just how fine Nikolai’s eyelashes are, the strength and line to his jaw. There are scars scattered across his face, and Mal isn’t sure if they’re from his time turned monster or his time as Sturmhond and he’s not sure it matters. What does matter, though, is how much he wants to reach out and brush a finger across them, just to make sure they’re real. 

Just to make sure the bright sun of Ravka can scar like the rest of them.

When his eyes make it back to Nikolai’s, he finds Nikolai staring at him still. Watching him. He can hear Alina’s voice – _clever fox_ – and he suddenly feels too warm. Too aware. Too caged in.

Mal’s eyes dart away in self-preservation, to the wall then down to the ground near his feet. He notices the box he’s pushed up against, the frame of a painting he should have thrown away. It takes him a moment to form the words, but he does speak them. “I wasn’t going to kill you- monster or not, you’re still the King of Ravka.”

Nikolai doesn’t move. Even if Mal’s words had a little bit of a bite. Instead, he keeps watching – as if there might be something more to see. Waiting.

“For some reason,” Nikolai starts a few moments later, tone contemplative. “I don’t know if I trust your loyalty to King and country as much as you’re trying to make me believe.”

The words trick Mal into looking back up, to find eyes that almost look a ruddy green and a smile that’s just this side of Sturmhond enough for his chest to flutter. Mal swallows.

“It would be treasonous if I said otherwise.”

Nikolai hums thoughtfully, his head tilting side to side. “Possibly. But it may have more to do with what the royal in power has to say on the matter. You may want to check with the standing king or queen. Though if it _were_ treasonous…exile can’t be more remote than this place, can it?”

This joke breaks through the tension with an ease and elegance only Nikolai can muster, and Mal almost laughs. He can feel the sound bubbling up from him. He pulls a hand up to cover his mouth and hopefully hide the noise. Nikolai’s brow arches.

“You’re allowed to laugh. I’m really quite funny.”

But Mal doesn’t, and instead takes a steadying breath. They’re still close enough that if he reached out, he could press a palm to Nikolai’s cheek without taking a step. Close enough to see his scars, yes, but also an echo of dark lies peeking out from under his collar.

The silence lingers again, but Nikolai doesn’t seem bothered by it, content to have the time to watch. Mal, in contrast, feels the overwhelming urge to fidget. Move.

 _Run_.

“Why are you doing this?” He asks instead, and it’s not accusatory. Or at least not trying to be. 

Nikolai shrugs, too easily. “It’s the holidays- Zoya wanted to make a charitable stop to a lesser-known orphanage. She’s quite giving and kind when you get past the harsh, cold outer exterior. And honestly? I think she’s got a _bit_ of a crush on one of the owners, but don’t tell her I told you. She’d kill me without a second thought.” Mal raises his eyebrows at that, waiting for the actual answer. He can tell a placeholder when he hears it. Nikolai, in turn, lets out a breath. “And I _am_ the King, now. I can go anywhere I like. One of the many perks of the job.”

Mal feels a surge of sudden confidence. Enough so to actually speak his mind. “That’s not what I mean. You didn’t pull me back here, away from the others, just to thank me.” 

Nikolai deflates, almost imperceptibly, and Mal watches it happen. Waits. They are close enough he can see Nikolai’s breathing quicken, despite no other signs, but Mal waits even still, not feeling the need to verbalize the repeated _well?_

This time Nikolai’s exhale is definitely a sigh. “You don’t make this easy.”

“Avoiding?”

“ _Conversing_.” Nikolai’s shoulders fall from their proud angles into something less kingly and more the insufferable twat Mal remembers best. This is an easier Nikolai to see - the kind who’d gotten him drunk, all those years ago. The kind who had been Sturmhond, once upon a time. The kind who had looked at him and _agreed_ when Mal wasn’t so sure of his decisions. This Nikolai tries to smile, sees Mal’s unimpressed look in return, and lets out a second long sigh as he runs a gloved hand (still gloved, always gloved) down his face. “No wonder you and Alina are such a mess.”

The comment stings, deep and thorough in Mal’s chest. There’s a lot he almost says about that, about who he and Alina _are_ , but he doesn’t. Nikolai notices the discomfort, eyes Mal, and then lets his hand drop.

“I don’t remember most of my time as the creature.” Nikolai repeats.

“You’ve already said that.” Mal is starting to regret pushing. Starting to regret each moment that passes. He should have taken the out Nikolai had given him - to head back into the lounge, to pretend this whole conversation never happened.

Instead, Nikolai keeps staring at him, and Mal can barely breathe, let alone think of walking away. His eyes are harder, decisive, and Mal sees something dark in them that reminds him of a quiet forest and an empty sky.

“It makes sense.” Nikolai continues, and Mal feels a slow build-up with each word. Feels how Nikolai all but completely ignores Mal’s comment. “I’d been infected with _merzost_ . Turned into something vile and feral and evil. I remember glimpses, moments that I guess _I_ actually came through, but they were nothing more than seconds that were gone as soon as they came. Flashes, feelings, but that’s about it.”

 _What are you getting at_? Mal feels too warm, despite the cool of the wood of the wall behind him.

“ _Except_ for this one, stubborn, _familiar_ tracker-” Nikolai’s eyes flash - bright and alive - and Mal feels the air rush out of him. Nikolai, to his credit, does not react. “Who just kept _coming back_ , again and again. I remember-” The darkness moves across Nikolai’s eyes again, but the bright hazel color of them returns just as quickly. “-trying to get him to leave. I was dangerous. I could _kill him_. But he kept coming back. Again and again. And he kept calling my name.”

Mal feels like his chest is going to either burst outwards or cave in on itself. Nikolai is still looking at him, unblinking, curious, and having the full weight of his attention feels like a burden Mal can’t quite hold.

( He wonders how Alina could have turned this down _twice_. Mal feels ready to do anything Nikolai asks. No request too far fetched. No question too extreme. )

He can’t stay like this, so he tries to cut in. “Your—”

“ _Don’t_.” 

So Mal doesn’t, the title dying in his mouth. Nikolai, for that moment, almost looks angry. Almost. But it disappears just as quickly as all the other looks before. Something about it feels dizzying, like Mal is somehow seeing each part of Nikolai try to break to the surface before being pulled back and hidden again. Anger, fear, hunger, embarrassment. A smaller, hidden part of Mal almost wants to reach forward and pull those pieces of him back. To buck up against Nikolai’s control of himself. 

Instead, it’s Nikolai who reaches out, quite literally, his gloved hand moving around Mal’s wrist and pulling his hand to the space between them. Mal doesn’t know what is happening and feels a swell of subdued panic at just how lost he feels in this, but Nikolai continues to lift Mal’s hand and sets his palm against Nikolai’s forehead.

The memory flashes - a cool breeze and the smell of trees and dirt surround him. The desperation that _this has to work_. That he doesn’t know what he’ll do if it doesn’t. Mal thinks, maybe, he should end this. Stop whatever this is. But suddenly Mal is back in the present and Nikolai’s eyes fall closed and he lets out a breath and a louder, more firm thought takes its place. A thought that sounds a lot like Nikolai.

 _Don’t pull away_.

He’s not sure either of them breathe. Despite the lack of any immediate connection like before, no sudden spark of energy, Mal’s palm fits against Nikolai’s forehead and his fingers feel the same silkiness of blond hair. He wants to brush his fingers back through it, wants to run his fingertips over the scars he sees scattering Nikolai’s jaw. But he won’t, he won’t so much as breathe, too afraid that if he so much as thinks too loudly the moment will break. Then, as if hearing Mal’s fears, Nikolai shifts to move Mal’s hand to his cheek - warmer than his forehead, softer. 

Nikolai’s eyes open, then, catching Mal’s. There’s something different in the way their eyes meet, something terrifying and comforting and wild all at once.

And then the explanation spills out of Nikolai, smooth but all at once. “I can’t _stop_ thinking about him. How he looked at me, even when I was a _monster_ , but without fear. Like he could see me, somewhere in there, even when I wasn’t sure I could see myself. But more than that, I could see _him_. The monster was either pushed away or calmed enough that I didn’t have to fight it, I could just. Be. I know Merzost when I see it. I’ve learned enough about it.”

Mal doesn’t understand, but he also can’t argue with it. He’d been there too, in those moments where the chaos and darkness of it all seemed to settle. Mal - before he’d sacrificed himself, and the powers with him - had been able to _tell_ that about animals in the woods. How fearful, how calm, how angry. He could sense it and he could quiet it, enough that they knew not to fear him. It’s not that he was any more quiet or stealthy than other trackers, but that something about him _calmed_ them. 

Just as he’d been able to sense Nikolai. Just as he’d been able to get Nikolai to _listen_. 

“I felt something, when he touched me. Like a rush of energy. Something that drew _me_ out to the forefront, something that made me feel like I had control again.”

It doesn’t make sense, but it also does. Just like most things concerning merzost, Mal can’t find it in him to question it.

He needs to pull away. He can feel something shift in the conversation, in the way Nikolai somehow feels closer and the way Mal still feels the need to close that distance. His thumb, idly, runs across Nikolai’s cheek and Nikolai’s eyes close again.

“It’s ridiculous, I know it’s ridiculous.” Nikolai continues to babble but Mal is only partially listening, because it’s _not_ ridiculous. Not really. “But I _felt_ a difference. When you were there. I felt more in control. And I know- you were the amplifier. The last one. Of course you’d have some kind of ability, or some kind of control over merzost, and of course that should make sense, but all I could think was how _hungry_ I was, and then you were there and I could think about more than that. Clearly.”

It’s a curious situation that Mal can’t stop watching. Nikolai, slowly unraveling. Nikolai, mumbling along like Mal isn’t standing there with his hand against his cheek, close enough to see the rise and fall of his chest, to barely notice something peeking out of his wrist from under the gloves and sleeves. The dark lines along his veins. To see how Nikolai’s face tilts _just so_ into his hand.

 _Why is he still talking_?

“I—” Nikolai stutters over the word, and Mal’s shock brings him out of that moment, though not entirely. Nikolai Lantsov? _Stuttering_? “I-” And then Nikolai lets out a breath that almost sounds like a laugh, but at the same time too honest to be one. “I want to kiss you, actually.” 

There is silence, heavy with shock, before Nikolai continues again. “And I _would_. Under normal circumstances. Or I’d at least ask, but-”

 _I want to kiss you_. And he would, normally. But he won’t. 

So instead it is Mal who kisses him. 

Closes the distance and simply kisses him. And for a single, stunning moment it’s good. Nikolai is warm and tastes vaguely of pine nuts and- saints, _saints_.

The moment that follows, though, is not as good. And the following begins to be awkward. Off. Mal feels the realization of what he’s just done wash over him like a cold bucket of water down his spine.

_You just kissed the high king of Ravka._

_You just—_

_Kissed._

_Nikolai Lantsov._

He should be praying for forgiveness. Not whatever it was that just crossed his mind.

Mal jerks away from him, then, but not quickly enough to avoid the slight flutter of Nikolai’s eyelashes, the surprise in his eyes when they open.

 _Fuck, fuck, what did you just_ **_do_** _?_

The need to run overwhelms him again, and Mal tries to start off, away from this. “I’m sorry, I didn’t-” But Nikolai is faster, the hand that had just been around Mal’s wrist reaches out to press against his chest to stop him. To push him back and hold him there, surprisingly strong. The air rushes out of Mal when his back meets the wall, and he watches Nikolai fully close the distance this time, his hand sliding down to Mal’s side as he presses what feels like the entire length of his body against him.

There is just long enough for Mal to think _oh saints_.

Nikolai kisses _him_ , this time, and it’s _very_ good. Very, very good. 

Because with the urgency and the desperate air to this kiss, Mal doesn’t have any time to think, or question, or wonder. There’s no time to panic, when it’s Nikolai’s hand he feels slide down to hold his hip. No time to second guess when it’s Nikolai’s other hand that moves to the back of Mal’s neck. So instead of trying to find that time, Mal simply lets himself be consumed by it. By him. His hands go first to Nikolai’s chest - some kind of false pretense of pushing him away - before they travel up to Nikolai’s neck, his jaw, his hair. He loses track of everything he runs his hands over after that, of his limbs and of Nikolai’s, of where they’re touching and moving and holding on, of everything except the kiss itself.

There’s a demand, somewhere in there. From Nikolai, made of Mal. And in response to that demand Mal pushes back, but not against it, and he feels the match of intent and thought and need, hot and heady. Nikolai wants this, wants _him_ , just as much as Mal is realizing he wants this in return.

Nikolai licks into Mal’s mouth and Mal meets him in that, finding purchase in Nikolai’s hair, in the sound Nikolai makes when he _tugs_. 

He doesn’t think about the orphanage around them, or how Alina and Zoya are just a few rooms away. He doesn’t think about the empty, hollow feeling in his chest he’s been hiding from. In fact, this is the first time in what feels like two years that he realizes he isn’t thinking about it at all.

For a few, glorious moments, it is just this. Nikolai, whose hands are warm despite the gloves. Nikolai, who tilts his face just so. Nikolai, who _keens_ into the kiss like he’s been thinking about this moment just as long as Mal hadn’t realized he had and who feels solid and whole and real.

Nikolai Lantsov, Major of the Twenty-Second Regiment, Soldier of the King’s Army, Grand Duke of Udova, and Ruler of the Double Eagle Throne. King of Ravka. 

Pressing Mal back against a stone wall while his fingers tugged, not uncomfortably, at the hair on the back of Mal’s neck.

It is Mal who breaks the kiss, pulling away and letting his head thud softly back against the wall as he forces air back into his lungs. Nikolai trails his mouth across Mal’s jaw, across his scar, then down the skin of his neck he can reach above Mal’s collar. He realizes at some point Nikolai had pressed a knee between Mal’s legs, and that Mal’s arms had moved around Nikolai’s shoulders to hold himself upright. That Nikolai’s hand at his hip has moved under the hem of his vest, but not yet his undershirt, and a tight, solid feeling settles in Mal’s gut.

 _This is dangerous_.

“I should have done that a long time ago.” Nikolai breathes against Mal’s collar. Their chests are pressed together, and Mal can feel Nikolai’s heart beating rapidly even through the layers. Can feel the desperate press of Nikolai’s crotch into Mal’s hip.

He takes pride in how Nikolai has to tilt up to kiss his neck.

“When?” Mal breathes back, turning his face to press his cheek against the side of Nikolai’s temple. His hair is a complete mess, and Mal feels a kind of pride in that, too. “After I’d died or when you still had claws and fangs?”

It’s meant to be a joke, sarcasm layered somewhere in the airy notes of the words. Nikolai tenses just long enough for Mal to notice, before he lets out a laugh.

“I meant earlier _tonight_. Or this year. I’ve thought about coming here for months.”

“But you didn’t.”

The pause is colder than their moments before.

“No, I didn’t.” 

Those words hang as a few seconds pass, as they simply exist in each other’s spaces, breathing in time with one another. Then, Nikolai slowly pulls himself away, unraveling their bodies enough to stand apart. Mal feels the cool air around him, but it’s nearly worth it to have a full view of Nikolai, disheveled and flushed. Nearly worth the cold rush of air over him, just for that moment. Before the king gets to work on straightening himself back up.

They are silent for those few minutes after they let their faces cool, their heartbeats slow. Mal watches Nikolai closely, the easy movement of him as he slowly pieces himself back into place. How he brushes back his hair, straightens the line of his tunic, rucks his shirt more firmly back into the waist of his trousers. When he finishes, he turns to Mal with his hands out, smiling in that false pretense kind of way. 

“Well?”

Mal blinks, feeling a bit like he was caught in the midst of his staring. “Well what?”

Nikolai’s grin slides into a smirk. His Sturmhond smirk. “ _Well_ \- do I still look like I just aggressively made out with someone in a back room?”

It takes a solid second for the words to settle, and then Mal laughs, once, before he pushes up off the wall and takes the four strides over to him. He straightens Nikolai’s collar, though it had been perfectly straight before, and brushes a hand across his chest. Just for a reason to touch him.

 _Dangerous_.

When he goes to step away, Nikolai is watching him again, curiously. Mal, uncomfortable under the gaze, frowns back at him. “What?”

Without answering, Nikolai reaches forward and runs his thumb along the scar across Mal’s jaw. It’s a startling feeling, the leather has had enough time to cool, and Mal wants to ask him what he’s looking for, where his mind has gone. But when he reaches for Nikolai’s wrist and pulls it away, the dark veins catch his attention again. His eyes move from them, to Nikolai, and Nikolai pulls his hand away with a bit more force than his cool demeanor lets on. The look says _it’s nothing_ which makes Mal even more convinced it’s not.

“About time we return to the festivities, don’t you think?” Nikolai turns, tugging at the sleeve of his coat, covering the dark lines Mal had glimpsed there. His voice is a little strained, but Mal can’t decide if it’s from what they’d just done or from being caught in some kind of lie.

“You’re not totally free of it, are you.” 

It’s not a question. Mal stands firm when Nikolai glances over his shoulder, then down to his wrist. Mal swears he can sense an urge to run from this, an urge he’d already fought down at least twice tonight, and realizes that technically, Nikolai can. Rather than answering, he can turn back and walk out the door without answering anything at all.

But he doesn’t. 

Instead, Nikolai sighs and shakes his head. There is a silence that follows that Mal refuses to fill, forcing Nikolai to continue. “It comes out when I sleep-- when I can’t consciously keep it at bay. It doesn’t happen often, definitely not _regularly_. It’s just—”

Mal waits, patient, hoping Nikolia will continue further and _explain_ what he means by that. The monster is still _in him_? It comes out at _night_? This is a national risk, isn’t it? If the King of Ravka is turning into a monster the second he goes to sleep?

Instead, he watches as Nikolai take a breath, pulling back the places of himself he’d barely let peek open, and gives Mal a small smile. “Makes for interesting walks of shame, you know? I’m afraid I’ve made things quite difficult for my counsel because of it, but leave it to me to make things interesting.”

There is a prickling of a thought in the back of Mal’s mind, then, as he feels himself connect the dots. The reason Nikolai is back here, the purpose behind wanting to bring this all up. He’s still fighting the monster, even now, even with the eyes of all of Ravka on him.

Why else would he corner Mal, in the midst of it all?

The thought of that leaves an acidic taste in the back of his throat. The idea that all of this had been for naught. _Disappointment._

But does Nikolai know? Rather than let the question eat away at him, Mal mutters, “I don’t have it anymore.”

Nikolai stops where he is, any of that extra movement he always seems to be making, stilled. Then he turns, fully, to face Mal back in the room. Again, from across the space, they meet eyes and something like shame, or guilt, creeps up along the back of Mal’s neck. 

“You came because of what happened when you were the monster, right? About how me being an amplifier helped you remember who you were?” That shame or guilt grows a bit hotter, traveling down the back of Mal’s neck into his spine. He’s not quite sure why, or what makes up the complicated swirl of emotions in his chest, but he doesn’t like it. Doesn’t like the acrid taste it leaves. “I don’t _have_ it anymore. No powers, no merzost, no nothing. Your trip was wasted.”

Mal swears his heart would stop in those following seconds if it weren’t for how _hot_ his ears and neck felt. Failing him, even now.

But then Nikolai tilts his head a bit to the side, his eyes narrowing, and all of the slowly growing anger seeps out of Mal in a rush, leaving behind the same, empty hollowness he’s been running from since the day he died. Nikolai seems to watch it happen, his own expression softening.

“Oretsev,” Mal hears _patience_ in Nikolai’s voice and he hates it. “I came here because I haven’t stopped thinking about wanting to kiss you since I was back to myself again, and realized I was thinking about it at all. It’s come to a point I’ve nearly become mad.” Mal blinks, not expecting anything close to that answer, and Nikolai laughs a bit breathily. “Unbecoming of a king, if you ask me. Pining after a boy who is supposed to be dead.” He touches his heart dramatically, and Mal rolls his eyes at it. “No- I decided to come see for myself. See if it really would be everything I dreamed of.”

Mal stares, feeling a bit...what? Insecure? Unsure? “And?”

The grin that Nikolai gives him is very clear. It says _I’m not answering that question_. Nikolai then turns back to the door and starts making his way out, which reminds Mal to fix his own coat, straighten his own hair. Zoya and Genya and Alina and David are just a couple rooms over and are probably wondering what’s taking them so long.

Just as the king of Ravka makes it to the doorway, he pauses and glances back with that smirk. The smirk that makes Mal’s heartbeat just a bit faster, just a bit harder. The Sturmhond smirk. Or- no. The _Nikolai_ smirk.

“Now you get to dream of me.”

And then he leaves.

**Author's Note:**

> AN2: and…..there it is! a few months worth of blood sweat and tears. I hope you enjoyed it nearly as much as i enjoy the fact it now exists and is out there in the world. woohoo!
> 
> regarding the sections and their corresponding (ish) chapters:
> 
> Section 1/TRUE SEA - chapter 7, Siege and Storm  
> Section 2/OUTSIDE OF KRIBIRSK - chapter 8, Siege and Storm  
> Section 3/OS ALTA - somewhere between chapter 19-22, Siege and Storm  
> Section 4/WEST RAVKA - chapter 5-6, Ruin and Rising  
> Section 5/SPINNING WHEEL - chapter 7, Ruin and Rising  
> Section 6/SPINNING WHEEL - chapter 11, Ruin and Rising  
> Section 7/SIKURZOI MOUNTAINS - chapter 12, Ruin and Rising  
> Section 8/SIKURZOI MOUNTAINS - chapter 13, Ruin and Rising  
> Section 9/SIKURZOI MOUNTAINS - chapter 13, Ruin and Rising  
> Section 10/SIKURZOI MOUNTAINS - chapter 13, Ruin and Rising  
> Section 11/SIKURZOI MOUNTAINS - chapter 13, Ruin and Rising  
> Section 12/SIKURZOI MOUNTAINS - chapter 13, Ruin and Rising  
> Section 13/THE UNSEA - chapter 17, Ruin and Rising  
> Section 14/KERAMZIN - epilogue/post epilogue  
> Section 15/KERAMZIN - post-epilogue
> 
> RE: MAL/ALINA.
> 
> You can love someone aggressively and wholly and completely but also not be in love with them. I think Mal and Alina mean the world to each other, and I also do ship them together!!! They’re very cute and soft and I love them!!! But I’m also a multishipper and the chemistry I wanted to explore is with Nikolai and Mal. :3 Therefore, as far as this canon-inspired fic goes, Mal loves Alina but is not in love with her in this fic, and Alina feels the same towards him. It’s good, people can have multiple very important and meaningful relationships, thank you and goodnight.


End file.
